Freenet means controversial information does not need to be stored in physical data havens such as this one, Sealand. Photograph: Kim Gilmour/Alamy

Fourteen years ago, a pasty Irish teenager with a flair for inventions arrived at Edinburgh University to study artificial intelligence and computer science. For his thesis project, Ian Clarke created "a Distributed, Decentralised Information Storage and Retrieval System", or, as a less precise person might put it, a revolutionary new way for people to use the internet without detection. By downloading Clarke's software, which he intended to distribute for free, anyone could chat online, or read or set up a website, or share files, with almost complete anonymity.

"It seemed so obvious that that was what the net was supposed to be about – freedom to communicate," Clarke says now. "But [back then] in the late 90s that simply wasn't the case. The internet could be monitored more quickly, more comprehensively, more cheaply than more old-fashioned communications systems like the mail." His pioneering software was intended to change that.

His tutors were not bowled over. "I would say the response was a bit lukewarm. They gave me a B. They thought the project was a bit wacky … they said, 'You didn't cite enough prior work.'"

Undaunted, in 2000 Clarke publicly released his software, now more appealingly called Freenet. Nine years on, he has lost count of how many people are using it: "At least 2m copies have been downloaded from the website, primarily in Europe and the US. The website is blocked in [authoritarian] countries like China so there, people tend to get Freenet from friends." Last year Clarke produced an improved version: it hides not only the identities of Freenet users but also, in any online environment, the fact that someone is using Freenet at all.

Installing the software takes barely a couple of minutes and requires minimal computer skills. You find the Freenet website, read a few terse instructions, and answer a few questions ("How much security do you need?" … "NORMAL: I live in a relatively free country" or "MAXIMUM: I intend to access information that could get me arrested, imprisoned, or worse"). Then you enter a previously hidden online world. In utilitarian type and bald capsule descriptions, an official Freenet index lists the hundreds of "freesites" available: "Iran News", "Horny Kate", "The Terrorist's Handbook: A practical guide to explosives and other things of interests to terrorists", "How To Spot A Pedophile [sic]", "Freenet Warez Portal: The source for pirate copies of books, games, movies, music, software, TV series and more", "Arson Around With Auntie: A how-to guide on arson attacks for animal rights activists". There is material written in Russian, Spanish, Dutch, Polish and Italian. There is English-language material from America and Thailand, from Argentina and Japan. There are disconcerting blogs ("Welcome to my first Freenet site. I'm not here because of kiddie porn … [but] I might post some images of naked women") and legally dubious political revelations. There is all the teeming life of the everyday internet, but rendered a little stranger and more intense. One of the Freenet bloggers sums up the difference: "If you're reading this now, then you're on the darkweb."

The modern internet is often thought of as a miracle of openness – its global reach, its outflanking of censors, its seemingly all-seeing search engines. "Many many users think that when they search on Google they're getting all the web pages," says Anand Rajaraman, co-founder of Kosmix, one of a new generation of post-Google search engine companies. But Rajaraman knows different. "I think it's a very small fraction of the deep web which search engines are bringing to the surface. I don't know, to be honest, what fraction. No one has a really good estimate of how big the deep web is. Five hundred times as big as the surface web is the only estimate I know."Unfathomable and mysterious

"The darkweb"; "the deep web"; beneath "the surface web" – the metaphors alone make the internet feel suddenly more unfathomable and mysterious. Other terms circulate among those in the know: "darknet", "invisible web", "dark address space", "murky address space", "dirty address space". Not all these phrases mean the same thing. While a "darknet" is an online network such as Freenet that is concealed from non-users, with all the potential for transgressive behaviour that implies, much of "the deep web", spooky as it sounds, consists of unremarkable consumer and research data that is beyond the reach of search engines. "Dark address space" often refers to internet addresses that, for purely technical reasons, have simply stopped working.

And yet, in a sense, they are all part of the same picture: beyond the confines of most people's online lives, there is a vast other internet out there, used by millions but largely ignored by the media and properly understood by only a few computer scientists. How was it created? What exactly happens in it? And does it represent the future of life online or the past?

Michael K Bergman, an American academic and entrepreneur, is one of the foremost authorities on this other internet. In the late 90s he undertook research to try to gauge its scale. "I remember saying to my staff, 'It's probably two or three times bigger than the regular web,"' he remembers. "But the vastness of the deep web . . . completely took my breath away. We kept turning over rocks and discovering things."

In 2001 he published a paper on the deep web that is still regularly cited today. "The deep web is currently 400 to 550 times larger than the commonly defined world wide web," he wrote. "The deep web is the fastest growing category of new information on the internet … The value of deep web content is immeasurable … internet searches are searching only 0.03% … of the [total web] pages available."

In the eight years since, use of the internet has been utterly transformed in many ways, but improvements in search technology by Google, Kosmix and others have only begun to plumb the deep web. "A hidden web [search] engine that's going to have everything – that's not quite practical," says Professor Juliana Freire of the University of Utah, who is leading a deep web search project called Deep Peep. "It's not actually feasible to index the whole deep web. There's just too much data."

But sheer scale is not the only problem. "When we've crawled [searched] several sites, we've gotten blocked," says Freire. "You can actually come up with ways that make it impossible for anyone [searching] to grab all your data." Sometimes the motivation is commercial – "people have spent a lot of time and money building, say, a database of used cars for sale, and don't want you to be able to copy their site"; and sometimes privacy is sought for other reasons. "There's a well-known crime syndicate called the Russian Business Network (RBN)," says Craig Labovitz, chief scientist at Arbor Networks, a leading online security firm, "and they're always jumping around the internet, grabbing bits of [disused] address space, sending out millions of spam emails from there, and then quickly disconnecting."

The RBN also rents temporary websites to other criminals for online identity theft, child pornography and releasing computer viruses. The internet has been infamous for such activities for decades; what has been less understood until recently was how the increasingly complex geography of the internet has aided them. "In 2000 dark and murky address space was a bit of a novelty," says Labovitz. "This is now an entrenched part of the daily life of the internet." Defunct online companies; technical errors and failures; disputes between internet service providers; abandoned addresses once used by the US military in the earliest days of the internet – all these have left the online landscape scattered with derelict or forgotten properties, perfect for illicit exploitation, sometimes for only a few seconds before they are returned to disuse. How easy is it to take over a dark address? "I don't think my mother could do it," says Labovitz. "But it just takes a PC and a connection. The internet has been largely built on trust."Open or closed?

In fact, the internet has always been driven as much by a desire for secrecy as a desire for transparency. The network was the joint creation of the US defence department and the American counterculture – the WELL, one of the first and most influential online communities, was a spinoff from hippy bible the Whole Earth Catalog – and both groups had reasons to build hidden or semi-hidden online environments as well as open ones. "Strong encryption [code-writing] developed in parallel with the internet," says Danny O'Brien, an activist with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a long-established pressure group for online privacy.

There are still secretive parts of the internet where this unlikely alliance between hairy libertarians and the cloak-and-dagger military endures. The Onion Router, or Tor, is an American volunteer-run project that offers free software to those seeking anonymous online communication, like a more respectable version of Freenet. Tor's users, according to its website, include US secret service "field agents" and "law enforcement officers . . . Tor allows officials to surf questionable websites and services without leaving tell-tale tracks," but also "activists and whistleblowers", for example "environmental groups [who] are increasingly falling under surveillance in the US under laws meant to protect against terrorism". Tor, in short, is used both by the American state and by some of its fiercest opponents. On the hidden internet, political life can be as labyrinthine as in a novel by Thomas Pynchon.The hollow legs of Sealand

The often furtive, anarchic quality of life online struck some observers decades ago. In 1975, only half a dozen years after the internet was created, the science-fiction author John Brunner wrote of "so many worms and counter-worms loose in the data-net" in his influential novel The Shockwave Rider. By the 80s "data havens", at first physical then online locations where sensitive computerised information could be concealed, were established in discreet jurisdictions such as Caribbean tax havens. In 2000 an American internet startup called HavenCo set up a much more provocative data haven, in a former second world war sea fort just outside British territorial waters off the Suffolk coast, which since the 60s had housed an eccentric independent "principality" called Sealand. HavenCo announced that it would store any data unless it concerned terrorism or child pornography, on servers built into the hollow legs of Sealand as they extended beneath the waves. A better metaphor for the hidden depths of the internet was hard to imagine.

In 2007 the highly successful Swedish filesharing website The Pirate Bay – the downloading of music and films for free being another booming darknet enterprise – announced its intention to buy Sealand. The plan has come to nothing so far, and last year it was reported that HavenCo had ceased operation, but in truth the need for physical data havens is probably diminishing. Services such as Tor and Freenet perform the same function electronically; and in a sense, even the "open" internet, as online privacy-seekers sometimes slightly contemptuously refer to it, has increasingly become a place for concealment: people posting and blogging under pseudonyms, people walling off their online lives from prying eyes on social networking websites.

"The more people do everything online, the more there's going to be bits of your life that you don't want to be part of your public online persona," says O'Brien. A spokesman for the Police Central e-crime Unit [PCeU] at the Metropolitan Police points out that many internet secrets hide in plain sight: "A lot of internet criminal activity is on online forums that are not hidden, you just have to know where to find them. Like paedophile websites: people who use them might go to an innocent-looking website with a picture of flowers, click on the 18th flower, arrive on another innocent-looking website, click something there, and so on." The paedophile ring convicted this autumn and currently awaiting sentence for offences involving Little Ted's nursery in Plymouth met on Facebook. Such secret criminal networks are not purely a product of the digital age: codes and slang and pathways known only to initiates were granting access to illicit worlds long before the internet.

To libertarians such as O'Brien and Clarke the hidden internet, however you define it, is constantly under threat from restrictive governments and corporations. Its freedoms, they say, must be defended absolutely. "Child pornography does exist on Freenet," says Clarke. "But it exists all over the web, in the post . . . At Freenet we could establish a virus to destroy any child pornography on Freenet – we could implement that technically. But then whoever has the key [to that filtering software] becomes a target. Suddenly we'd start getting served copyright notices; anything suspect on Freenet, we'd get pressure to shut it down. To modify Freenet would be the end of Freenet."Always recorded

According to the police, for criminal users of services such as Freenet, the end is coming anyway. The PCeU spokesman says, "The anonymity things, there are ways to get round them, and we do get round them. When you use the internet, something's always recorded somewhere. It's a question of identifying who is holding that information." Don't the police find their investigations obstructed by the libertarian culture of so much life online? "No, people tend to be co-operative."

The internet, for all its anarchy, is becoming steadily more commercialised; as internet service providers, for example, become larger and more profit-driven, the spokesman suggests, it is increasingly in their interests to accept a degree of policing. "There has been an increasing centralisation," Ian Clarke acknowledges regretfully.

Meanwhile the search engine companies are restlessly looking for paths into the deep web and the other sections of the internet currently denied to them. "There's a deep implication for privacy," says Anand Rajaraman of Kosmix. "Tonnes and tonnes of stuff out there on the deep web has what I call security through obscurity. But security through obscurity is actually a false security. You [the average internet user] can't find something, but the bad guys can find it if they try hard enough."

As Kosmix and other search engines improve, he says, they will make the internet truly transparent: "You will be on the same level playing field as the bad guys." The internet as a sort of electronic panopticon, everything on it unforgivingly visible and retrievable – suddenly its current murky depths seem in some ways preferable.

Ten years ago Tim Berners-Lee, the British computer scientist credited with inventing the web, wrote: "I have a dream for the web in which computers become capable of analysing all the data on the web – the content, links, and transactions between people … A 'Semantic Web', which should make this possible, has yet to emerge, but when it does, the day-to-day mechanisms of trade, bureaucracy and our daily lives will be handled by machines talking to machines." Yet this "semantic web" remains the stuff of knotty computer science papers rather than a reality.

"It's really been the holy grail for 30 years," says Bergman. One obstacle, he continues, is that the internet continues to expand in unpredictable and messy surges. "The boundaries of what the web is have become much more blurred. Is Twitter part of the web or part of something else? Now the web, in a sense, is just everything. In 1998, the NEC laboratory at Princeton published a paper on the size of the internet. Who could get something like that published now? You can't talk about how big the internet is. Because what is the metric?"Gold Rush

It seems likely that the internet will remain in its Gold Rush phase for some time yet. And in the crevices and corners of its slightly thrown-together structures, darknets and other private online environments will continue to flourish. They can be inspiring places to spend time in, full of dissidents and eccentrics and the internet's original freewheeling spirit. But a darknet is not always somewhere for the squeamish.

On Freenet, there is a currently a "freesite" which makes allegations against supposed paedophiles, complete with names, photographs, extensive details of their lives online, and partial home addresses. In much smaller type underneath runs the disclaimer: "The material contained in this freesite is hearsay . . . It is not admissable in court proceedings and would certainly not reach the burden of proof requirement of a criminal trial." For the time being, when I'm wandering around online, I may stick to Google.

Sunday, November 29, 2009

Formed in the Fifties... One of the most influential, secretive, and, it goes without saying, exclusive politicalclubs in the West... One member contacted by this newspaper said he could not talk about it "even off, off the record". Another simply put the phone down... The source of its funding is a mystery..."- June 29, 1997, The Independent, 'Aitken dropped by the Right's secret club', one of the very few mainstream reports on Le Cercle.

Im also attaching the book of David Teacher who wrote a full lenght book about Le Cercle

ROGUE AGENTSThe Cercle Pinay complex 1951 - 1991byDavid Teacher----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Copyright 1993 and 2008, David Teacher. All rights strictly reserved.A former translator at the EU, the author now works as an internationaladministrator in Geneva. He may be contacted at david-teacher@hotmail.com.-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------The author does not necessarily endorse or espouse the contents or opinionsof any website which may host this article or any interpretation of thisresearch that may be produced by third parties.------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------PREFACE(2008)The text which follows is the 100,000 word manuscript of a book intended forpublication in 1992-1993 as the culmination of several years of research on theCercle Pinay complex of groups, some of which had previously appeared in theLobster magazine in the UK in 1988-1989.Back in those pre-Internet days, publication meant paper; as the text hadsoon swelled beyond the limits of a Lobster Special Issue, this meant commercialpublishers. Ironically foreshadowed in the Introduction, the manuscript fell victim toits main claim to any merit – that it was the first multinational investigation of apaneuropean covert complex, the Cercle Pinay and its many national associates.Editors in several countries expressed great interest in publishing the manuscript …providing that the "foreign bits" could be reduced and the book refocused on theirrespective countries.With little chance of integral publication, the book project was shelved and,apart from one major revision in 1993-94 to integrate Brian Crozier’s memoirs whichconfirmed the main thrust of this investigation, the manuscript gathered dust for thenext fifteen years. The world moved on, and the events described below, hot newswhen the book was completed, became old history.Things would have remained like that had I not recently come across the ISGPwebsite run by Joel van der Reijden (www.isgp.eu) - as far as I can see, the onlyserious investigation of the Cercle Pinay since the original articles by Robin Ramsayand myself in the Lobster twenty years ago. In appreciation of Joel's efforts, I amhappy to dust off the manuscript again and add it to his impressive research in thehope that the information contained here will serve those who wish to continue theinvestigation.In revisiting the manuscript in 2008, I have not integrated print sourcespublished after the book was last revised in 1993-94, a mammoth task and asuperfluous one in the light of the ISGP website. The most recent print sourceintegrated here is therefore Alan Clark's diaries, published in 1994; a list ofunintegrated print sources can be found at the beginning of the Bibliography. I havehowever expanded the biographical information on some individuals mentioned inthe original manuscript, taking further details from the Web, recent press reportsand the ISGP site. Apart from that, I have not integrated Joel van der Reijden'sresearch which stands on its own; this investigation should therefore be read inconjunction with his and, of course, with Crozier's memoirs.David Teacher--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------INTRODUCTION(1993)One of the paradoxes of modern political journalism is its inherent culturalisolation. Whilst no-one would deny that the major political developments in a givencountry may owe much to international forces, the investigation of politicalprocesses has remained overwhelmingly confined within national boundaries. This ispartly due to the linguistic problems, specialist knowledge and additional burdeninvolved in researching foreign politics; however, this cultural isolation is alsocompounded by a vague and usually unexpressed opinion that the connections of aforeign Conservative MP cannot be of great import to a better understanding of themurkier side of politics at home in one's own country. Yet it is clear that no countryis an island. This is nowhere more true than in the field of parapolitics, the networksof unofficial power that, usually via serving or retired friends in the world's majorintelligence and security services, exert greater influence than is generally realizedon national political life. Both the private networks of influence and the intelligenceservices work internationally; more often than not, they work hand in hand in ashady world that brings together top politicians and veterans of covert action,counter-subversion and media manipulation. An investigation to delineate suchnetworks of covert transnational cooperation must, to succeed, tackle thecomplexities of the unseen political world in many countries.This study is an attempt at a preliminary transnational investigation of thePaneuropean Right and particularly of the covert forum, the Cercle Pinay and itscomplex of groups. Amongst Cercle intelligence contacts are former operatives fromthe American CIA DIA and INR, Britain's MI5, MI6 and IRD, France's SDECE,Germany's BND, BfV and MAD, Holland’s BVD, Belgium's Sûreté de l’Etat, SDRAand PIO, apartheid South Africa's BOSS, and the Swiss and Saudi intelligenceservices. Politically, the Cercle complex has interlocked with the whole panoply ofinternational right-wing groups: the Paneuropean Union, the European Movement,CEDI, the Bilderberg Group, WACL, Opus Dei, the Moonies, Western Goals and theHeritage Foundation. Amongst the prominent politicians associated with the CerclePinay were Antoine Pinay, Konrad Adenauer, Archduke Otto von Habsburg, FranzJosef Strauss, Giulio Andreotti, Paul Vanden Boeynants, John Vorster, GeneralAntonio de Spinola, Manuel Fraga Iribarne, Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan.Despite a wealth of covert operations centring on media campaigns topromote or denigrate election candidates, the international impact of the Cerclecomplex has not yet [1993] been the main focus for an investigation in any language.The information contained in this study was compiled from a sheaf of internaldocuments from the Cercle Pinay and its partners, the Belgian AESP, the British ISCand the Swiss ISP, as well as over one hundred books and numerous Press reportsin English, French, German and Spanish (all translations by this author).The insight afforded is only partial; as Brian Crozier wrote in his memoirsabout this author's previous research on the Cercle complex: "There are pitfalls inwriting about confidential matters from the outside, and drawing on similarlyhandicapped material" (1). However, the publication in 1993 of Crozier's memoirs,Free Agent - The Unseen War 1941-1991, served to confirm the main thrust of thisinvestigation and filled in some but by no means all of the loopholes; in turn, thisinvestigation has uncovered some of what Crozier preferred to conceal. Once thefragmented information is pieced together, the network that emerges cannot beoverlooked: the Cercle complex can be seen to be an international coalition of rightwingintelligence veterans, propaganda assets and top politicians who would shapethe 1970s and 1980s.To take the British example, much of the destabilization of British democracyin the 1970s can only be fully understood by analysing the international supportgiven to groups like the Anglo-American “deniable propaganda” outlet, the Institutefor the Study of Conflict. The Cercle Pinay was a major source of support for the ISCvirtually from its inception on; the Cercle Pinay and the ISC also tied in with anotherkey British group, the Foreign Affairs Research Institute, heavily funded by BOSS,apartheid South Africa's secret service. BOSS's other incursions into domesticpolitics in Britain, notably their smear operations against leading Liberals such asJeremy Thorpe and Peter Hain, were a significant factor in the hijacking of Britishdemocracy in the 1970s. Three Cercle members on the FARI Board assisted FARI'sactions from 1976 through to the early 1980s. FARI in many ways was the Britishsuccessor to a previous Cercle operation to support South Africa; the Cercle and theISC had been active partners in setting up a Paris-based propaganda outlet in 1974as part of South Africa's covert media campaign later exposed in the "Muldergate"scandal.German intelligence reports on the Cercle Pinay written in late 1979 and early1980 which were published in Der Spiegel in 1982 also shed new light on a"Thatcher faction" within MI6 in the lead-up to the Conservatives' 1979 electionvictory. Whilst receiving wide publicity in France and Germany, these reports havenever been covered by the British Press. This serious omission is astounding in thelight of the undeniable authenticity of the reports and the startling allegations theycontain: one of the German intelligence reports dated November 1979 quotes aplanning paper by Crozier about a Cercle complex operation "to affect a change ofgovernment in the United Kingdom (accomplished)". The report goes on to describe aworking meeting held at Chequers, the Prime Minister’s country residence, just afterthe Conservatives' election victory which brought together Prime Minister Thatcher,serving MI6 Chief Sir Arthur Franks, and two Cercle complex members - BrianCrozier and former MI6 Division Head Nicholas Elliott. Crozier's planning paperquoted by the German report also specifically mentioned international Cerclecampaigns "aiming to discredit hostile personalities and/or events".This is no isolated example; throughout the 1970s the Cercle Pinay complexwas active in similar ways in France, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Italy and Belgium.In the latter three countries, the Cercle complex also had close links to those waginga strategy of tension to support a right-wing coup, the latest example of which wasthe strategy of tension which killed 32 people in Belgium from 1982 to 1985. TheCercle complex’s other covert campaigns to promote right-wing candidatesconcentrated in two key periods: the mid-1970s and 1979-80, both central to theelectoral defeat of the Left throughout Europe generally.In order to make the complexities of the Right in several European countriesunderstandable to readers, I have focused on the personnel links between groups inthe Cercle Pinay complex. The Cercle Pinay itself is an informal but confidentialstrategic talking-shop consisting of a core of "regulars" who invite occasional gueststo Cercle meetings and who are assisted by a range of associates in many nationallybasedgroups. As one of the tendencies of such groups is for their members to "playmusical chairs", changing place frequently on the raft of names sponsoring anorganization, a personnel-based research approach can give rise to the danger ofover-estimating the ties that link some characters or organisations. Sharing a Boardmembership with someone does not necessarily imply intimate knowledge of theother's various activities.The fragmentary nature of the information available does not allow us to drawdefinite conclusions about to what extent a particular group or person was aware ofCercle operations, particularly of those run by several of the Cercle "regulars" withintelligence experience who would later form a private covert intelligence service, the6I, within the Cercle complex. Crozier himself makes the point that many of theprominent politicians invited to sit in on Cercle strategic sessions had no knowledgeof their hosts’ more clandestine operational activities – if only because of the "need toknow" principle. Nonetheless, a stalwart multi-functionary on the Boards of severalgroups linked to the Cercle can be presumed to have some deeper involvementbeyond just lending his name to the cause. This study can only be a beginning; acloser look at some of those involved at national level could shed more light on thesignificance of the Cercle complex. The only point of certainty beyond theinformation given here is that the Cercle merits further investigation.Finally, this book is dedicated to the small community of unpaid parapoliticsresearchers who have done much to uncover the truth that lies behind the history ofthe 20th century. Two in particular deserve thanks for the help and encouragementthey have given me in compiling the information given here: Robin Ramsay of theLobster and Jeffrey M. Bale of the University of Berkeley, California. Many journalistshave already covered fragments of the Cercle Pinay complex: Péan, the Spiegel, Rothand Ender, Ramsay and Dorril of the Lobster, Dumont, Mungo, the ArbeitskreisNicaragua who produced IGfM, the Young European Federalists, Herman andO'Sullivan, Gijsels, and Brewaeys and Deliège were all important sources.David Teacher-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------1945 - 1965POSTWAR PANEUROPEANSTHE PANEUROPEAN REVIVAL: THE PEU, HABSBURG AND CEDIIn the immediate post-war period, several political figures jostled for positionin setting up movements for European unity. The oldest movement was thePaneuropean Union (PEU), a movement for European Union that had been foundedin 1922 by Comte Richard Coudenhove Kalergi, the PEU's Life President.Coudenhove Kalergi had also set up the Interparliamentary Union, a debating forumfor members of parliament from many countries, which still exists today.Serving as Vice-President of the PEU under Coudenhove Kalergi wasArchduke Otto von Habsburg, born in 1912 as eldest son of Karl, the last Austro-Hungarian Emperor, and heir to his throne as well as Opus Dei's candidate asmonarch to rule over a united Catholic Europe (2). As well as his imperialpretensions, Habsburg was a prominent advocate of European Union and the regalmentor of the Bavarian Christian Social Union party (CSU), the future fief of FranzJosef Strauss (3).In 1948, Habsburg founded the Centre Européen de DocumentationInternationale (CEDI), an international grouping of conservatives which aimed tobreak the isolation of Franco's Spain in Europe by organizing annual congresses inMadrid (4). CEDI held annual congresses in Madrid from 1952 onwards, although itwould only be formally incorporated in 1957 with headquarters in the Bavariancapital of Munich, a reflection of Habsburg's influence as CEDI Life President. CEDIwould grow rapidly; by the early 1960s, it had sections in eleven Europeancountries. As one might expect, Habsburg's political protégé Strauss was a regularearly participant at CEDI's annual conferences.Co-founder of CEDI with Habsburg was future Spanish diplomat and MinisterAlfredo Sanchez Bella, at the time of CEDI's foundation working as Director of theInstituto de Cultura Hispanica. In 1957, Sanchez Bella was appointed SpanishAmbassador to the Dominican Republic, then Colombia in 1959, and finally Italyfrom 1962 to 1969 before being recalled to serve in Franco's Cabinet. He also hadinfluential contacts within Opus Dei: his brother, a leading member of Opus Dei,founded Opus Dei's University of Navarra in 1952 (5). Sanchez Bella would laterbecome one of the key figures in the Cercle Pinay complex when serving as Franco'sMinister for Information and Tourism (6).THE EUROPEAN MOVEMENT, THE CCF AND THE BILDERBERG GROUPOne of the hidden architects of post-war European politics was Polish exileDr. Joseph Retinger. Retinger's campaigning, always clouded in secrecy, would giverise to the creation of open political bodies such as the Strasbourg-based Council ofEurope as well as CIA-funded rivals to the PEU, the European Movement and theEuropean Youth Campaign, and more clandestine bodies like the powerbrokers'covert forum, the Bilderberg Group.Retinger's European Movement was the main component in the CIA'scampaign to infiltrate and control the wave of political sentiment favourable toEuropean union in the immediate post-war period. The European Movement wasfinanced from the outset by the CIA, receiving some £380,000 between 1949 and1953. The CIA also supported another Retinger creation, the European YouthCampaign, which received £1,340,000 from the CIA between 1951 and 1959. Theconduit for CIA funding of the EM and EYC was the American Committee on aUnited Europe, launched in 1949 specifically to support the creation of the EM.ACUE's list of officers included four top figures from the American intelligencecommunity. The post of ACUE Chairman was filled by Bill Donovan, former Directorof the CIA's wartime predecessor, the OSS; another prominent ACUE post was heldby General Walter Bedell Smith, CIA Director from 1950 to 1953. ACUE's Vice-Chairman was Allen Dulles, Bedell Smith's successor as Director of the CIA from1953 to 1961; its Executive Director was Thomas Braden, head of the CIA'sInternational Organization Division, responsible for setting up CIA front groupsthroughout the world (7).Despite early post-war collaboration between Coudenhove Kalergi andRetinger, represented by EM co-founder Duncan Sandys, conflicts soon emerged (8).Coudenhove Kalergi's authoritarian leadership style was only one of the bones ofcontention; it was also felt that he did not take a robust enough position in relationto the Cold War. Indeed, in his later book entitled From War to Peace written in 1959,Coudenhove Kalergi called for the public recognition of the division of Germany -anathema to conservatives and to many PEU members. In his book, CoudenhoveKalergi also criticized the position of Retinger's European Movement: "this newEuropean Movement felt that its first task was not the strengthening of world peacebut the defence of Europe against the imperialism of the Soviet Union and theliberation of the oppressed nations of Eastern Europe. It received considerablesupport from the United States via the Marshall Plan and therefore was an integralcomponent of the anti-Bolchevik alliance set up by the Americans in both the Eastand the West" (9).In the light of his conciliatory – or rather, inflammatory – position, the CIApreferred not to count on Coudenhove Kalergi's Paneuropean Union but rather to setup a new organization for European unity over which it could have greater control.Led by Retinger and Sandys, the cold warriors decided to go their own way, foundingthe European Movement as a rival to the PEU. The two complexes - Retinger's andCoudenhove Kalergi's - would co-exist in competition until Coudenhove Kalergi'sdeath in 1972. Under his successor Habsburg, the PEU was relaunched bothmaterially and ideologically; after some internal controversy, Habsburg brought thePEU over to a Cold War philosophy, opening up the possibility of collaborationbetween the PEU and the EM.Besides the 1949 foundation of the European Movement, the CIA'sInternational Organizations Division headed by Thomas Braden also created anotherfront organisation, the Congress for Cultural Freedom, which aimed to bringtogether Western intellectuals in the cause of anti-Communism. The CCF would seethe light of day in dramatic circumstances; on the day of the CCF's foundation at aWest Berlin conference on 24-25th June 1950, North Korea invaded its southernneighbour.The CCF would run several features services spanning the globe: ForumInformation Services in English, Preuves-Informations in French and El Mundo enEspanol in Spanish. The CCF would also publish a range of literary magazines suchas Encounter and Survey in London, Quadrant in Australia, Cuadernos in BuenosAires and Cadernos Brasileiros in Rio de Janeiro. The CCF has been the subject ofextensive research (10); at this stage, it is sufficient to note that the CCF would hireBrian Crozier in 1964 and would launch him as a media asset for the Westernintelligence services by creating the CIA-funded news agency Forum World Featuresin 1965.Alongside the European Movement and the Congress for Cultural Freedomwhich functioned as mass political and cultural fronts, Joseph Retinger and the CIAcreated a third forum which was to be far more secretive and more influential thanthe EM or the CCF – the Bilderberg Group. On the 25th September 1952, a smallgroup of eminent statesmen and dignitaries met with the aim of creating the newforum; the distinguished - and discreet - guests included from the NetherlandsPrince Bernhard, from France the new Prime Minister (11) Antoine Pinayaccompanied by politician Guy Mollet, from Belgium the Foreign Minister Paul VanZeeland, from Italy Prime Minister Alcide de Gasperi and from the US General WalterBedell Smith, CIA Director from 1950 to 1953 and member of the Board of theAmerican Committee for a United Europe (ACUE), the funding conduit for theEuropean Movement. Named after the venue for their first formal meeting in May1954 in the De Bilderberg Hotel in Oosterbeek near the Dutch town of Arnhem, thisinternational group of decision-makers still meets at least once a year forconfidential discussions of world affairs (12).PINAY, VIOLET AND STRAUSSOne of the most prominent members of the new Bilderberg Group was theFrench politician Antoine Pinay who served as Minister of Public Works, Transportand Tourism from July 1950 to March 1952 before becoming President of theCouncil (Prime Minister) and Minister of Finance until January 1953. He would laterserve as Minister for Foreign Affairs from February 1955 until February 1956, andMinister of Finance again from June 1958 to January 1960 (13). Apart from hisdistinguished career in public office, Antoine Pinay had other less obvious attributes.Convinced of the need for Franco-German reconciliation, Pinay would create anetwork of contacts that would finally take form as the Cercle Pinay; via the selectclub of Bilderbergers, Pinay had easy access to the top figures in internationalpolitics and finance.Pinay's less overt political consultations owed much to his confidant, righthandman and eventually successor at the helm of the Cercle Pinay, Jean Violet. Itwas in 1951 that Antoine Pinay first met Violet, a Parisian lawyer close to the CNPF,the French employers' federation. Pinay sought out Violet for legal advice about warreparations payments for a Geneva-based firm whose German factory had beenseized during the war. Pinay was evidently satisfied with Violet's work as herecommended the lawyer to Pierre Boursicot, head of the French secret service, theService de Documentation Extérieure et Contre-Espionnage (SDECE). Violethelped the SDECE where he could; as he has said: "Aware of the fact that I could beof some use to my country thanks to my professional situation on the internationalchessboard, I chose to fight for France within the ranks of the SDECE" (14).After the arrival of General Grossin as head of the SDECE in 1957, Violet wastaken on as an agent and given missions of increasing political importance. Violetwould rise to become perhaps the SDECE's most valued 'Honourable Correspondent'with the title of Special Advocate to the service. One indication of Violet’s significanceas a veteran covert operator is the fact that throughout his fifteen years of servicewith the SDECE, his case officer was the head of the service - first Grossin from1957 to 1962, then Jacquier from 1962 to 1966, and then finally Guibaud until1970. Reporting directly to General Grossin, "Violet was masterminding a ServiceSpécial to promote the General's [de Gaulle’s] objectives in defence and foreignpolicy" (15), a rather ironic fact bearing in mind that Brian Crozier, Violet’s futureassociate in the Cercle, was monitoring de Gaulle’s defence and foreign initiativeswith some suspicion from the other side of the Channel.An early associate of Violet's in his work for the SDECE was fellow SDECEagent Rev. Father Yves-Marc Dubois, foreign policy 'spokesman' for the Dominicanorder, unofficial member of the Pontifical Delegation to the UN, and believed by theSDECE to be the head of the Vatican secret service. The pair were active in theUnited Nations in the mid-1950s when Violet was attached to the French delegationheaded by Antoine Pinay, at that time Minister of Foreign Affairs. Violet's task at theUN was to win over the twenty republics of Latin America so as to block UNcondemnation of France's Algerian policy. Violet's lobbying in the UN would alsopave the way for de Gaulle's tour of Latin America in 1964.Another major focus for Violet and Dubois' activities for the SDECE wasEastern Europe: they received half a million francs a month from General Grossin torun the "Church of Silence", Catholic networks behind the Iron Curtain. Theseactivities focused on the countries in what was sometimes referred to as the"Catholic Curtain": Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Romania (16).Besides these operations for SDECE, Violet would act as the homme deconfiance of Antoine Pinay in assisting the process of Franco-German reconciliation.Pinay had already played a considerable part in the conclusion of prior agreementson the construction of Europe, notably the Paris Treaty and Bonn Agreement of 1952whose ratification in May 1955 allowed Germany to attain full sovereignty andcreated the Western European Union, the first postwar European defence pact.Following this, the signature in March 1957 of the Euratom and European CommonMarket Treaties would lead to the creation of the European Economic Community asof January 1st, 1958."Violet played an historically key rôle between 1957 and 1961 in bringingabout this [Franco-German] rapprochement, which is the real core of the EuropeanCommunity. He had developed a close friendship with Antoine Pinay, who hadserved as French Premier in 1951 under the unstable Fourth Republic. At a lowerlevel, a complementary rôle was played by his SDECE colleague AntoineBonnemaison [described in the next chapter]. Violet was the go-between in secretmeetings between Pinay and the West German Chancellor, Konrad Adenauer, andhis coalition partner, Franz Josef Strauss. These paved the way for Charles deGaulle's own encounters with Adenauer, which culminated in the Franco-GermanTreaty of January 1963 ... The Pinay Cercle was a natural offshoot of Jean Violet'sFranco-German activities" (17).Franz Josef Strauss, the "Lion of Bavaria", would be a key figure in theCercle complex from the founding of the post-war Federal Republic until his death in1988. Born in 1915, Strauss was first elected to the German Parliament in 1949 asan MP for the Bavarian Christian Social Union (CSU) party, coalition partner ofAdenauer's CDU; that year, he was also appointed CSU General Secretary. In 1953,four years after his entry into the Federal Parliament, Strauss gained ministerialrank as Minister without Portfolio; he would again serve in Adenauer's CDU/CSUCabinet as Nuclear Power Minister from 1955 to 1956 and as Defence Minister from1956 to 1962.Meanwhile, on the regional level, the CSU Party Chairman Hanns Seidel, aformer Bavarian Prime Minister, had died in 1961; Strauss replaced him as PartyChairman, a post he would hold until his death twenty-seven years later. Within ayear of his elevation to Chairman, the CSU won a landslide victory in the 1962regional elections, gaining an absolute majority in the Bavarian Parliament that itwould not lose for another 46 years until its electoral rout in September 2008 forcedthe CSU into coalition.As the German constitution forbids regional premiers serving as federalministers, and as Strauss was the rising CSU star in national government as formerDefence Minister, he stayed on the federal level and served as Finance Ministerduring the Grand Coalition with the SPD in 1966-69. In 1978, he returned toregional politics, being elected Prime Minister of Bavaria as a springboard for a 1980bid for the Federal Chancellorship. Despite substantial Cercle support, his bid wouldfail; Strauss would nonetheless remain Prime Minister of Bavaria for a decade untilhis death in 1988.Besides his public career in German government office, Strauss had hadother more private connections; he was an early ally of Pinay's in the mid 1950swhen both Strauss and Pinay were at the height of their political careers, as Straussdescribed in his memoirs:"Since 1953 [having first been appointed minister], I had had close ties toAntoine Pinay; these later changed into a kind of paternal friendship for me from aman who was 25 years my senior ... [in 1955] I met Pinay in the office of one of hisconfidants [Maître Violet?] on the avenue Foch. I was well acquainted with this circleof opponents of Pierre Mendès-France, ousted in early February; one could trustthem; with a little imagination we could have considered ourselves to be coconspirators"(18).Strauss also met Pinay during the closeted discussions of the BilderbergGroup, a forum which Strauss had frequented since the September 1955 Bilderbergconference in Garmisch-Partenkirchen, close to Munich. Strauss and Pinay met, forexample, at the Bilderberg conference in Cannes in May 1963 (19); the same year,Strauss also attended the CEDI Congress in Madrid with Habsburg (20). One earlyexample of cooperation between Strauss, Pinay and Violet came in 1964, whenViolet, acting for Pinay and recommended by former Defence Minister Strauss,presented enormous claims for reparations to the German Finance Ministry,allegedly for deliveries of metals to the Germans during the occupation of France.Strauss advised that the Ministry pay up in the interests of Franco-Germanfriendship, but it transpired that the delivery notes were fake, and the swindle wasexposed (21).THE BONNEMAISON FORUM AND INTERDOCIn March 1955, the Bilderberg Group met in Barbizon near Paris to discuss"Communist influence in the West, European Communist parties and political,ideological and economic ripostes to the Red Menace" (22). This CIA-linkedpowerbrokers' forum was not the only group of covert decision-makers to debate theissue; the European intelligence services were also sponsoring attempts at Franco-German rapprochement with an aim to strengthen anti-communism. One key earlyfigure was the French SDECE's Colonel Antoine Bonnemaison, who under thecover of a SDECE front group called the Centre de Recherches du Bien Politique,was responsible for coordinating all psy-ops work carried out by the CinquièmeBureau (23). From 1955 on, Bonnemaison began acting as organizing secretary for aseries of informal meetings, held alternately in France and in Germany, whichbrought together top intelligence veterans from three countries: France, Germanyand Holland. "The blend of 'delegates' [in 1959] was basically the same in all three[national] groups: intelligence, both civil and military; leading academics; nonacademicpolitical or economic specialists; one or two trusted politicians; leaders ofindustry; trade union leaders; and clerics of various denominations ... thesemeetings ... were very productive in terms of facts, background, analysis andintelligent discussion" (24).The idea of a covert European alliance to fight communism was discussed in1957, when a Franco-German group met in the South of France to discuss whatsteps could be taken to combat Communism. Their first decision was to reinforcetheir network; by the following year, the circle had widened to includerepresentatives from Holland, Italy, Switzerland and Belgium. A further expansion toinclude the UK came in 1959 following Bonnemaison's chance encounter theprevious year with the then Editor of the Economist Foreign Report, a man who wouldlater become undoubtedly the most prominent propagandist for several Westernintelligence services and the key character in the UK counter-subversion complex -Brian Crozier (25).Born in 1918, Brian Rossiter Crozier started his career in journalism in 1936.Having worked in aeronautical inspection in 1941, he was hired by the news agencyReuters, which had links to MI6, in 1943. After a spell at the News Chronicle in 1944and the Sydney Morning Herald in 1948, he returned to Reuters in 1951. From 1952to 1954, Crozier toured the South-East Asian conflicts in Vietnam and Malaya forReuters and the New Straits Times, which was used during the Malayan emergencyas a channel for British disinformation prepared by the Foreign Office's InformationResearch Department (IRD). It was in Saigon that Crozier started his longpartnership with MI6 by meeting "Ronald Lincoln", a friendship renewed back inLondon when both men had returned home in 1954. Crozier would then also meet asecond MI6 officer "Ronald Franks" who would act as his link for several years.Thanks to the fruitful exchange of information with his MI6 contacts, "Lincoln" and"Franks", Crozier joined the staff of the Economist in September 1954 as Editor oftheir prestigious Economist Foreign Report, a post he filled until 1964 (26).Having met Crozier in 1958, Antoine Bonnemaison invited Crozier as the firstever British visitor to attend one of his colloques, held this time near Frankfurt.There were three delegations present from France, Germany and the Netherlands,and each included senior intelligence officers. The French delegation was led byGeneral Jean Olié, de Gaulle's Chief of General Staff, seconded by SDECE's ColonelBonnemaison.The German delegation was led by General Foertsch, "a senior deputy" toGeneral Reinhard Gehlen, founder of Germany’s post-war intelligence service, theBundesnachrichtendienst (BND). The delegation also included two other membersclose to the BND, "Professor Lades and Kernig, both specialists on Communism ingeneral and East Germany in particular. There was a German equivalent ofBonnemaison's Centre: the Deutsche Vereinigung für Ost-West Beziehungen (theGerman Union for East-West Relations). The Vereinigung was based in Munich,appropriately close to the headquarters of the BND at Pullach" (27). Althoughnothing else is known of this Vereinigung quoted by Crozier, Professor Hans Ladesand Dr. C. D. Kernig also belonged to another mysterious body, the Verein zurErforschung sozial-politischer Verhältnisse im Ausland (Association for the Studyof Foreign Socio-political Relations), a registered charity also conveniently based inMunich. Amongst the Verein's members, Professor Lades and Dr. Kernig regularlyattended Bonnemaison's meetings whilst Dr. Norman von Grote would join them asthe third German founding member of INTERDOC in 1963. Von Grote had been anofficer in Wehrmacht FHO (Fremde Heere Ost - Eastern Front intelligence) withspecial responsibility for liaison with Russian General Vlassov and his army of Nazicollaborators, the NTS (28). FHO was commanded from 1st April, 1942 onwards byGeneral Gehlen; it was Gehlen himself who had adopted Vlassov and defended theidea of an anti-communist army under Vlassov against strong pressure fromHimmler (29).The Dutch delegation was represented by two top veterans from theBinnenlandse Veiligheidsdienst (BVD), the Dutch internal security service, LouisEinthoven and C. C. 'Cees' Van den Heuvel. Einthoven had been ChiefCommissioner for Police in Rotterdam in the 1930s. After the war, he was appointedby General H. J. Kruls to head the Bureau Nationale Veiligheid, renamed the BVD in1946; Einthoven would then serve as the BVD's first director, retiring only in 1961.He played a key role in the Dutch Gladio component, Operaties & Inlichtingen (O&I -Operations and Intelligence), also founded in 1946 by General Kruls. Einthovencommanded the Operations Division of O&I which was in charge of preparing forarmed resistance but was also crucially tasked with "sensitizing people to the dangerof communism during times of peace" (30). As for Van den Heuvel, he was a civilservant in the Dutch Interior Ministry and a former head of the ResearchDepartment of the BVD, in which capacity he liaised closely with O&I. Having played"a heroic rôle in the Dutch Resistance during the Nazi occupation", Van den Heuvelwas already well acquainted with the principles of stay-behind networks (31).In August 1959, Van den Heuvel set up a foundation for research into humanecology based in the Hague. The title is indicative, if not conclusive: in 1955, the CIAhad founded a Society for the Study of Human Ecology which changed name in 1961to become the Human Ecology Fund. Both American organizations were fundingconduits for the CIA's MK-ULTRA programme of research into mind control andbrainwashing (32). Van den Heuvel's human ecology foundation would soon changetitles to the Oost-West Stichting (East-West Foundation), which received fundingfrom the BVD. According to an Italian secret service (SIFAR) report dated October1963, the BVD funded a meeting in Barbizon near Paris on 5th - 8th October 1961where "the participants decided to unite all efforts and initiatives of the struggleagainst Communism within a new organization and place these on a serious andexpert footing" (33).An international documentation centre to pool efforts against Communismbecame particularly necessary after Charles de Gaulle's decision to close downFrance's psychological warfare unit, the Cinquième Bureau, too full of ex-Algeriahands for de Gaulle's comfort. The demise of the Cinquième Bureau also meant thewithdrawal of SDECE's support for the Bonnemaison group. Bonnemaison himselfresigned from the SDECE and set up a private-sector structure, the Centred'Observation du Mouvement des Idées, receiving funds from Péchiney and AirLiquide. This could provide for continuing the colloques, which became dominated bythe French, but such a structure would clearly be insufficient to support the scale ofoperations planned for the documentation centre, and so the Dutch BVD took overwhere the SDECE had left off. A new organisation was formally incorporated in theHague in February 1963 under the name INTERDOC - the InternationalDocumentation and Information Centre - with Van den Heuvel as its Director.Alongside Einthoven and Van den Heuvel, two other Dutch founding members ofINTERDOC were Herman Jan Rijks and Dr. J. M. Hornix. The news was broken atthe Bonnemaison forum's meeting in Bad Godesberg near Bonn in late March 1963(34).According to the registration papers deposited in the Hague, INTERDOC'stask was "documentation in the field of Western values and world communism andthe informing of the public on these matters. This aim is to be pursued through theestablishment of an international documentation centre, which will cooperate withnational centres in different countries". An internal INTERDOC report indicates thatswift progress was made in setting up "an index system, a library, a collection ofnewspapers and a collection of special reports, documents, etc" which were madeavailable "to official departments responsible for the East-West question,international companies and employers' organizations" (35).Initial funds for INTERDOC were provided by Royal Dutch Shell, who wouldlater be a benefactor to the ISC and to other MI6 front groups like the ArielFoundation (36). The most eminent administrator of Royal Dutch Shell was PrinceBernhard of the Netherlands, President of the Bilderberg Group from its formalcreation in 1954 until his resignation in 1976 as a result of the Lockheed bribesscandal (37). In the early days of INTERDOC, Einthoven, now retired from the BVD,was active as a fundraiser; in his 1974 autobiography published in Holland (38),Einthoven states that he was lobbying for support for INTERDOC from France,Holland, Italy, Switzerland, Israel and Indonesia. During the 1960s, INTERDOC alsoseems to have received funding from the US, Germany and Britain. Crozier reportsthat INTERDOC "depended largely on West German subsidies" (39).The British intelligence community also offered considerable high-levelsupport for INTERDOC even before its creation. Crozier reports that he "was involvedfrom the start" with INTERDOC; amongst the other founding members in 1963 weretwo senior British intelligence officials: Charles H. "Dick" Ellis of MI6 and later ofthe Australian Security Intelligence Organisation ASIO, and "an ex-MI5 man" whoCrozier declines to identify. As for Ellis, he had first encountered INTERDOC at theirpreparatory meeting in Mont Saint Michel in the late spring of 1962 (40). Thefollowing year, when INTERDOC was founded, Ellis wrote to Sir William Stevenson,Ellis's former boss within the wartime US/UK liaison group in New York, the BritishSecurity Coordination, to tell him that he had been recommended to a neworganization by Sir Stuart Menzies, the MI6 Chief who had founded several of theEuropean Gladio components:"I am kept busy with this INTERDOC organization. And, together with otherchaps, I have formed a working committee which is organizing aninternational conference at Oxford in September [Ellis was at this timeattached to St. Antony's College, Oxford, close to MI6]. We have raised moneyfrom [deleted] and some professional groups, much to the astonishment of theForeign Office who said that it couldn't be done. They are now wondering if itwas a good thing to kick me out [of MI6] ... as several of us are now doingprivately what they have never succeeded in doing - getting an "action group"going. We are keeping it "private and confidential", as publicity could kill it"(41).INTERDOC's other link to British Intelligence, the "ex-MI5 man" not named byCrozier, was Walter Bell. During the war, Bell like Ellis had served under Stevensonat BSC in New York before moving to London in 1942 to act as liaison officerbetween MI6 and the OSS. Bell then joined MI5 in 1949 and worked as an adviser tovarious Commonwealth governments and as personal assistant to MI5 chief RogerHollis. After his retirement from MI5 in 1967, Bell worked on obtaining funding forINTERDOC from British sources (42). British help for INTERDOC came from,amongst others, the anti-union outfits Common Cause and the Economic League;by 1969, Neil Elles of Common Cause and John Dettmer of the Economic Leaguewould sit with Crozier, then Director of Forum World Features, on the ConsultativeCouncil of INTERDOC (43).INTERDOC's Italian founding member in 1963 also had intelligenceconnections. Professor Luigi Gedda was a well-known figure of the Catholic Right inItaly and one of the CIA's main agents in their massive intervention in the 1948elections which banished the spectre of a Communist victory and installed theChristian Democrats in power. Part of Gedda's rôle was to set up a national networkof 20,000 anti-communist groups, the Comitati Civici. Funded by the CIA andsupported by the Vatican, the Comitati each had their own intelligence departmentand a radio transmitter, and played a key part in ensuring a Christian Democratvictory: "according to the American Embassy and the CIA representative in Rome,they undertook 'psychological warfare' and were considered by the Embassy to bethe most important anti-communist group, which the Embassy felt justified asubsidy of $500,000 from the State Department to the CIA" (44).After 1948, as head of Azione Cattolica, Gedda had powerful politicalconnections within the ruling Christian Democratic Party. His leadership of AzioneCattolica and his intimate friendship with Pope Pius XII, to whom he was medicaladviser, gave him high-level access to the Vatican, access which he used to helpJoseph Retinger of the CIA-funded European Movement and the Bilderberg Group.In May 1950, Gedda arranged an audience with Pope Pius XII for Retinger, whohoped to win Vatican support for the cause of European Union. The meeting wasalso attended by the Vatican's Substitute Secretary of State, Monsignor Montini,the future Pope Paul VI. Despite a very positive meeting, objections from theArchbishop of Canterbury, Dr Fisher, caused the plan to fail. Nonetheless, Geddalater gave Retinger "a good deal of help in Italy" (45).ALBERTINI, GRAU AND SAGERA number of front groups referring to East-West relations would be set up bythe European intelligence services in the late 1950s. Of these, the German BNDfront group the Deutsche Vereinigung für Ost-West Beziehungen and the DutchBVD front group the Oost-West Stichting were certainly involved in theBonnemaison forum and its reincarnation as INTERDOC in 1963. However, threepropagandists active in the late fifties and early sixties in France, Germany andSwitzerland also need some mention at this stage. Whilst their links with INTERDOCremain unclear, all would later be involved in the counter-subversion operationsorganized by the Cercle complex in the mid-1970s.Georges Albertini, one of the mainstays of post-war French anti-communism,had had a controversial war-time past: a former right-hand man of the pro-Nazicollaborator Marcel Déat during the Occupation, Albertini had been a member of theVichy administration working in the Secretariat of the Vichy Prime Minister PierreLaval. After being jailed for two years for collaboration, Albertini became an ardentGaullist, helped by his schooltime days with Georges Pompidou. Through hiscontacts in politics and his work as a political adviser to the Worms banking andbusiness consortium, Albertini set up "a huge network of informants and helpers",and acted as an 'honourable correspondent' of the SDECE, as well as an unofficialadviser to Pompidou and later to Jacques Chirac. Albertini was a longstandingassociate of Antoine Pinay: both men had attended a series of conferences on Sovietpolitical warfare organized in 1960-61 by Suzanne Labin of WACL's French section(46). Besides his network of contacts, Albertini also produced the fortnightlymagazine Est-Ouest, "the most authoritative publication in the French language onthe problems of Communism" in Crozier's view, a publication which may well havebeen part of the INTERDOC network (47). As well as serving as one of the majorchannels for anti-Socialist propaganda in the mid-1970s, Albertini would alsobecome closely involved in the Cercle complex, publishing the ISC's output inFrench, attending Cercle meetings and playing a significant part in Crozier's privateintelligence service, the 6I.Karl-Friedrich Grau, Federal Secretary of PEU Germany until 1975, was oneof the shadier figures within the CDU, acting as a bag-man for illegal election fundcontributions from various foundations for both the CDU and for its Bavarian sisterparty, Strauss's CSU. Grau acquired a considerable reputation for the ruthlesstactics he used to support the conservative cause; he ran several smear anddisinformation campaigns for the CDU/CSU through a network of anti-communistpropaganda groups which he controlled. The first group in this network was theStudiengesellschaft für staatspolitische Öffentlichkeitsarbeit (Study Group onPolitical Communication), founded in Frankfurt in 1958 by Grau and CDU memberDr. Walter Hoeres. The Study Group's stated goal was to give "reliable and effectiveinformation and revelations about powers and their plans to destroy the fundamentsof our Christian, free, democratic social organization" and to "strengthen andreinforce the free, democratic State and social form, and to coordinate all efforts andmeasures to defend it against all kinds of totalitarianism". As "the largest and mostinfluential of the political front groups within the Federal Republic", the FrankfurtStudy Group and Grau's other groups would be major German disinformationoutlets throughout the 1970s and would act as German relays for the Cerclecomplex’s counter-subversion operations (48).Dr. Peter Sager was a well-known Swiss "éminence grise of anti-communistpropaganda" and later member of the Swiss Parliament. Born in 1925, Sager hadbeen educated in Switzerland, the Soviet Union (as part of Harvard University'sstudy programme) and the UK. In 1948, Sager created the SchweizerischeOsteuropa-Bibliothek (Swiss Library on Eastern Europe, now part of the Universityof Berne). In 1959, one year after Swiss representatives had joined the debate onCommunism in Europe, Sager founded the Schweizer Ost-Institut (SOI, SwissInstitute for the East) in Berne. SOI’s publications would be widely circulatedthroughout the German-speaking world, as well as being distributed in the UK.Major support for the SOI was provided from its inception by Karl-Friedrich Grau. In1961 Grau and Sager founded a Frankfurt-based SOI support group with the nameSchweizerisch-Deutsche Gesellschaft für Ostforschung (Swiss-German Society forResearch on the East). Sager was President and Grau Secretary-General, whilst theBoard of the new group included Sager's partner Heinz Luginbühl. Grau alsoensured the distribution of the SOI magazine in Germany throughout the 1960s.1964 - 1970MOBILISATIONTHE BIRTH OF THE STRATEGY OF TENSIONThe Paneuropeans and Europe's private spies were not the only people tomobilize; in the mid-1960s, the forces of renascent fascism in Europe would regroup,most notably in Italy and in Portugal. In order to give an all-too-brief account of themain facts of interest to this history of the Cercle complex, we must first look at theItalian General Giovanni De Lorenzo.Appointed head of the Italian secret service SIFAR in 1956, De Lorenzo wouldcombine this post with that of Commandant of the Carabinieri from 1962 onwards.Following the 1963 elections, in which the Communists gained 25% of the vote, DeLorenzo used his unprecedented powers to launch a vast anti-communist operationwhich started with the training of the 'gladiators' the same year. Simultaneously,with some twenty top Carabinieri commanders, De Lorenzo finalized Plan Solo, acoup d'état scheduled for the summer of 1964 which included the assassination ofPrime Minister Aldo Moro and his replacement by a right-wing Christian Democrat.Opposition to the coup would be minimized by a wave of preventive arrests based onthe files that De Lorenzo had built up on 157,000 people since 1959. The coup wascancelled at the last moment as the result of a pact between the Socialists and theChristian Democrats, but De Lorenzo continued planning for a later coup.Also in 1964, under De Lorenzo's leadership, SIFAR (renamed SID in 1966)funded the creation of the Alberto Pollio Institute which would organize a year laterthe now infamous conference which marked the ideological birth of the strategy oftension. Held in the Parco dei Principi hotel from 3rd - 5th May 1965, theconference was attended by the elite of the Italian military and the extreme Right,including Europe's most notorious fascist terrorist, Stefano delle Chiaie, a key actorin the stragi which rocked Italy throughout the 1970s.Delle Chiaie's group Avanguardia Nazionale (AN) was founded in 1959 withfunding from prominent industrialist and banker Carlo Pesenti, a future backer ofthe Cercle complex and the sniffer plane project, detailed below. AN had beenpreparing for a strategy of tension since the spring of 1964 when the Italian neofascistmilitants had followed courses in terrorism and psychological warfare. As wellas the AN militants Franco Freda and Giovanni Ventura, another close associate ofdelle Chiaie's during this period was Guido Giannettini, a journalist on militaryaffairs, expert in revolutionary warfare and SIFAR informant. A veteran in fascistcircles, Giannettini also had high-level transatlantic connections: in 1961, he hadbeen invited to give a presentation at the US Marines' College in Annapolis on "Thetechniques and possibilities of a coup d'état in Europe", a lecture attended byPentagon officials and CIA officers (49). Giannettini did not confine himself to theory,giving shelter to former OAS members who had fled to Italy after their abortive coupattempt in 1962 (50). Whilst visiting Spain in 1962, Giannettini was awarded thehonour of 'Captain of the Crusade' by the OAS for his services (51). Through hiscontacts with SIFAR/SID, Giannettini could also ensure a certain degree ofprotection for delle Chiaie's militants. Giannettini and delle Chiaie both attended theParco dei Principi conference; Giannettini himself gave a presentation on "The varietyof techniques for the conduct of revolutionary warfare", a subject he tackled ingreater depth in his book published the same year, The techniques of revolutionarywarfare.The year after the Parco dei Principi conference, the paramilitary far Right andthe OAS joined forces to set up the now-notorious revolutionary fascist groupAginter Press in September 1966. Sheltered in Lisbon under the protective wing ofdictator Salazar, Aginter Press was run by former OAS activist Yves Guérin-Sérac,with delle Chiaie one of the pioneers of the strategy of tension. Aginter Press workedunder the cover of a press agency, but in reality was a coordination centre fordestabilization. In close cooperation with the Policia Internacional e de Defesa doEstado (PIDE), Salazar's secret service, one section of Aginter Press ran a parallelintelligence service with links to the CIA, the German BND, the Spanish DGS, theSouth African BOSS and the Greek KYP. Another section of Aginter Press organizedthe recruitment of terrorists for bomb attacks and assassinations - an importantcontact here was delle Chiaie. A third group dealt with psychological operations, andAginter Press's fourth section, called Ordre et Tradition, was an international fascistcontact network with a clandestine paramilitary wing, the Organisation Arméecontre le Communisme International.Aginter Press's Italian contacts included delle Chiaie and Giannettini, one ofthe most active Aginter Press members, responsible for liaising between Aginter'sLisbon offices, delle Chiaie's AN and the Italian secret services. Aginter Press startedup in Lisbon in September 1966, and the Italian strategy of tension would belaunched in April 1969 with AN's bomb in Milan. After the failure of Plan Solo in1964, another coup attempt would be launched on the night of 7th December 1970.In Operation Tora Tora, now known as the Borghese coup after its fascist leaderPrince Borghese, the putschists who included delle Chiaie and other AN and FronteNazionale militants seized the Ministry of the Interior but then withdrew,abandoning the operation on "orders from above". News of the coup attempt wassuppressed by SIFAR, and none of the participants were prosecuted. Amongst thoseimplicated in the Borghese coup were several of the members of the Istituto diStudi Strategici e per la Difesa (ISSED) in Rome, an Italian body that wouldcooperate closely with Brian Crozier's Institute for the Study of Conflict in the 1970s,described in the next chapter.ISSED's founder, General Diulio Fanali, a former Chief of General Staff of theAirforce, was one of the people accused with delle Chiaie and Giannettini ofinvolvement in the Borghese coup. Fanali's name would also crop up in the judicialinquiry into the Rosa dei Venti network. The Director of ISSED's magazine Politica eStrategia was Filippo de Iorio, a close friend of Giulio Andreotti with links to theItalian secret service. A future member of the P2 lodge run by Licio Gelli, de Iorio wasforced to flee Italy after being implicated in the Borghese coup with Fanali,Giannettini and delle Chiaie. The Co-Director of the ISSED magazine was EggardoBeltrametti, who with Giannettini was one of the speakers at the 1965 Parco deiPrincipi conference. Beltrametti would also be mentioned alongside Giannettiniduring the judicial inquiry into the Milan bombings which launched the strategy oftension in 1969 (52).IRD, FORUM WORLD FEATURES AND THE ISC.Amongst the Allied partners in the immediate postwar period, it was theBritish who had first recognized the need to check the threat of communismthroughout the colonies and at home. Unlike the CIA's future programme whichconcentrated on the creation of mass movements like the European Movement andthe Congress for Cultural Freedom, the British Foreign Office had decided in 1947-48 to counter the ideological offensive launched by Stalin by setting up a covertpropaganda and disinformation unit called the Information Research Department(IRD) (53). The IRD would grow to become the biggest department in the ForeignOffice with some 400 staff. The IRD network of 'press agencies' which distributedboth attributable research papers and unattributable briefings would serve as themodel for one of the CIA's most important clandestine media manipulationoperations.In 1965, the International Organizations Division of the CIA decided to use itsintellectual front, the Congress for Cultural Freedom, to create a new propagandaoutlet, a press agency called Forum World Features. This CIA features service,which, at its peak, supplied over 150 newspapers worldwide, would be run from itslaunch in 1966 until its exposure in 1974 by Brian Crozier. Whilst still Editor of theEconomist Foreign Report, Crozier had already provided articles for the CCF journalEncounter as well as working on commission for the IRD for whom he "transformed athick folder of IRD documents into a short book" later published under the title Neo-Colonialism as part of a series called Background Books. After his departure from theEconomist in February 1964, Crozier accepted a part-time consultancy for IRD,advising departments and writing research papers. A few weeks later, Crozier wascontacted by the CCF who offered him the job of taking over the CCF's featuresservice and commercialising its output. Tied up with the IRD consultancy and othercontracts, Crozier refused but accepted a second more limited commission: to tourSouth America and report on how the CCF could improve the distribution of theSpanish-language version of their magazine, Encounter. Concerned by Crozier'sinvolvement with a CIA front, his MI6 contacts invited Crozier to MI6 headquartersupon his return in November 1964 and commissioned him to write an extensivebackground report on Sino-Soviet subversion in the Third World; a sanitized versionof the report would be published in 1966 as part of the Background Books seriesunder the title The Struggle for the Third World (54).In May 1965, Crozier finally accepted the post of Director of the CCF featuresservice, Forum World Features, and Crozier started at FWF that July. Initial controlof FWF ran via two CIA officers, CCF President Michael Josselson, and FWF auditor"Charles Johnson". The legal and financial infrastructure for FWF was provided byone of the CIA's "quiet channels", millionaire John Hay Whitney, a wartime memberof the OSS (55), former US ambassador to Britain during Crozier's time at theEconomist and future publisher of the International Herald Tribune. Whitneyobligingly registered FWF under his own name as a Delaware corporation with officesin London (56); CIA funding for FWF was channelled through Kern HouseEnterprises, a publishing firm run by Whitney. For a while, wrangles betweenCrozier and the CCF continued about FWF's independence from the CCF; Croziereventually ensured complete separation of FWF from the CCF and direct control viaa CIA case officer he calls "Ray Walters". Walters brought in an office manager, CecilEprile, and FWF opened its doors on January 1st 1966.Crozier was however absent for much of 1966, researching a biography ofFranco in Spain. An interview with the Caudillo won Crozier high level access withinthe Phalangist government and particularly with Manuel Fraga Iribarne, Franco'sMinister for Information and Tourism from 1962 to 1969 when he handed over thepost to Alfredo Sanchez Bella, co-founder of CEDI with Otto von Habsburg. Fragawould later become a key Spanish partner in the Cercle complex and a leadingconservative politician in the post-Franco era (57).It was also in Madrid that Crozier met one of the future main backers of theUK counter-subversion lobby: Frank Barnett who ran the New York-based NationalStrategy Information Center (NSIC) with the assistance of his Director of Studies,Henry Trager. Barnett had had long experience in propaganda and the CIA, havingserved in the late fifties and early sixties as Program Director of the Institute forAmerican Strategy, a Cold War propaganda group founded in 1958. Barnett'scolleagues in the IAS were IAS Administrative Director Edward Lansdale, anarchitect of CIA covert operations in Vietnam, and William Kintner, a CIA planningofficer for 11 years. The IAS had been founded as the response of the Military-Industrial Conference of 1958 to a National Security Council Directive the same yearrecommending that "the military be used to reinforce the Cold War effort". The IASbecame the vehicle for the National Security Council's propaganda campaign andran into controversy in 1961 for its political indoctrination of the military and its useof active-service military personnel for its foreign policy propaganda in civilianforums. After the IAS, Barnett would go on to found the NSIC in 1962 together withwartime OSS veteran William Casey, Reagan’s future campaign manager and hisfirst Director of the CIA (58). During their 1966 meeting in Madrid, Barnett invitedCrozier to come over to the United States once his Franco research was over. Thevisit would not occur until 1968 but would ensure substantial backing for a futureCrozier venture (59).Soon after Crozier returned from Spain, his previous insistence on a completeseparation of FWF from the CCF in early 1966 was vindicated. In March 1967, theAmerican magazine Ramparts exposed covert CIA funding of a series oforganisations. This revelation was compounded by an article by Thomas Braden,head of the CCF's parent body, the International Organisations Division of the CIA,which linked the CCF to the CIA. Despite the attention devoted to the CCF as aresult of this exposure, FWF prospered and by the 1970s had added a Spanishservice followed by French and Chinese, becoming one of the CIA's main covertpropaganda outlets which would run for eight years before its exposure in 1974. Inreflection of FWF's importance, Crozier recalls flying to Washington and Langleythree or four times a year in the early seventies for briefings with Cord Meyer and theCovert Action department (60).Crozier's operation with FWF would considerably expand with the advent of1968 which brought student revolt and a major change in intelligence and securityservice tasking: subversion from the New Left. IRD asked Crozier to prepare abriefing paper on the New Left which was circulated in 1969 under the title The NewApostles of Violence; a condensed version was marketed by FWF and placed with theWashington Post and the London Times. For IRD, Crozier then expanded his paper"on the basis of a vast supply of classified documents" into a book entitled TheFuture of Communist Power which "incorporated, with slight amendments, the paperon political violence I had prepared for IRD" (61).As Crozier noted: "In this increasingly threatening situation, I saw a seriousgap. Existing institutes or research centres (or 'think tanks' as the Americans calledthem), however worthy, were either too academic, or too neutral, or too heavilyconcentrated on hardware strategy ... they failed to take account of the moredangerous Soviet strategy of takeovers by 'non-military' means, such as subversionand terrorism ... The need, as I saw it, was for a research centre which wouldproduce studies on the ever-widening range of groups and forces bringing violence,chaos and disruption into our societies, but always in the context of Soviet strategy"(62). Crozier therefore set up a low-key features service within FWF called theCurrent Affairs Research Services Centre in 1968. CARSC started publication of aseries of monthly monographs on conflict, the first one appearing in December 1969.Crozier records that "the Agency had permitted me to produce the first five ConflictStudies under CARSC as a commercial imprint" using the FWF address; the sixthwould go out in January 1970 under the name of Crozier's new venture, theInstitute for the Study of Conflict (63).Kern House provided the start-up capital for the ISC, and Crozier functionedboth as Director of FWF and of the ISC. Several of FWF's research staff and the FWFlibrary were absorbed into the ISC; FWF then paid the ISC the sum of £2,000 for useof the library it had once owned. Oil companies put up seed capital: first was Shell,who put up £5,000 a year for three years, and British Petroleum £4,000 for twoyears (64). Then the real money came in, thanks to the Agency and via an oldAmerican friend: Frank Barnett of the NSIC (65). Having met Barnett in Madrid in1966, Crozier visited him in New York in 1968. When the ISC was then set up in1969-70, the NSIC provided substantial assistance. Apart from a guaranteed regularpurchase of each issue of the Conflict Studies, Barnett’s NSIC also provided thesalary for one of the ISC's researchers and footed the printing and publicity bill forthe ISC's annual publication, the Annual of Power and Conflict (66).Above all, beyond NSIC funding, Barnett could provide contacts, arranging ameeting with Dan McMichael, who would remain a true friend to Barnett’s NSIC formore than fifteen years, serving on the Advisory Council at least until 1984.McMichael was administrator of the trust funds of the Scaife family, majorshareholders in Gulf Oil. Barnett persuaded Richard Mellon Scaife ("Dick Scaifeas he liked to be called – a tall, fair-haired man with film-star good looks", asCrozier puts it) to provide $100,000 a year for the ISC as well as taking over theFWF subsidies from Jock Whitney. According to Crozier: "From that moment on,the ISC took off" (67). Between 1973 and 1981, Dick Scaife would donate a total of$6 million to the NSIC and their London friends at the ISC.The Foreign Office's covert propaganda arm IRD also contributed to thesetting-up of the new Institute; indeed, "IRD became the midwife of the ISC" (68).When seeking initial funding to set up the ISC in January 1970, Crozier wrote to apowerful friend, Sir Peter Wilkinson, a senior SOE veteran and former head of IRDlater to become Coordinator for Security and Intelligence in the Cabinet Office.Wilkinson arranged for a retired Major-General, Fergus A. H. Ling, to act as afundraiser for the ISC in military circles; Ling would serve as the ISC's FinancialDirector before becoming its Defence Services Consultant. This early assistance forthe ISC by a former head of IRD was only the beginning; almost all the key ISC staffwere former MI6, IRD, CCF or FWF personnel:- Brian Crozier was Director of both FWF and the ISC, and a consultant to IRD.- Iain Hamilton, a former Editor of the Spectator, replaced Crozier as ManagingEditor of FWF before moving to the ISC as its Editorial Director. Both Crozier andHamilton were fully aware of the CIA's role in supporting FWF and the ISC.- Michael Goodwin, the ISC's Administrative Director, had been involved with theCCF since January 1951 when he was a founding member and Honorary Secretaryof the British Society for Cultural Freedom, subsidized by the CCF to the tune of£700 a month deposited in Goodwin's account. As the editor of the journal TheTwentieth Century and a contract employee of the IRD, Goodwin was considered bythe CCF's Paris office to be "a vital contact", and as such the CCF bailed outGoodwin's endebted journal in 1951 with a lump sum payment of some £3,000 anda monthly subsidy of £150. As for the British Society, it had gotten off to a shakystart and was soon riven by dissensions centred on Goodwin; he resigned in January1952, and worked for the IRD from 1952 to 1956 as editor of the Bellman Booksseries for Ampersand, the IRD's publishing outlet. Goodwin's post as Secretary of theBritish Society was then filled by the IRD's John Clews (69).- Nigel Clive, a former MI6 officer, was head of IRD from 1966 to 1969 before writingfor ISC and acting as ISC's editorial consultant.- Kenneth Benton retired in 1968 after a 30 year career in MI6; he then joined theISC whilst their Conflict Studies were still published by the Current Affairs ResearchServices Centre of FWF.- David Lynn Price, a regular author of ISC Conflict Studies, first worked for IRDbefore moving to FWF in 1969 and the ISC in 1970.- Peter Janke, the ISC's senior research officer, had also worked for IRD.- Patrick 'Paddy' Honey, a Vietnam expert and former colleague of Brian Crozier onthe Economist Foreign Report, wrote for both IRD and ISC.- Tom Little, another Economist journalist, was a central figure in an IRD front, theArab News Agency, before writing Conflict Studies for the ISC (70).Another important staff member of the ISC who would become Crozier'sinseparable partner throughout the 1970s and 1980s was Australian-born RobertMoss. Moss, educated at the University of Canberra and the London School ofEconomics, first met Crozier in 1969 when Moss came to see him with anintroduction from his father-in-law Geoffrey Fairbairn, a founding member of the ISCCouncil (71). A central figure in the ISC and many later Crozier ventures, Mosswould follow Crozier's precedent in becoming Editor of the Economist Foreign Reportin the mid-1970s and would rise to become one of the CIA's main disinformationassets, particularly in the campaign to destabilize Chile's Salvador Allende in 1973.Besides its staff's extensive links to MI6, IRD and FWF, the ISC also had onits Council senior figures from MI5 and the military intelligence community:Leonard Schapiro, ISC Chairman from 1970 on, had been a war-time member ofMI5 and an adviser to MI6's G. K. Young some time between 1953 and 1956, whenYoung as Director of Requirements was reorganizing MI6's chaotic informationcollation and analysis methods (72). In the 1970s, Schapiro held the Chair of SovietStudies at the London School of Economics; he would later be a foreign policyadviser to Thatcher. A top military intelligence officer was Vice-Admiral Sir Louis LeBailly, Director-General of Intelligence at the MoD from 1972 to 1975 and a memberof MI5's recruitment panel, who would later serve on the ISC Council, as would SirEdward Peck, former Chairman of the Joint Intelligence Committee.Two leading counter-insurgency experts would also join the ISC Council, thefirst being Sir Robert Thompson, a key figure in the British Army's campaignduring the Malayan Emergency of the late 1950s. As Deputy Secretary of Defence forMalaya in 1957 and Permanent Secretary for Defence from 1959 to 1961, Thompsonhad drafted the Briggs Plan, introducing the "strategic hamlet" concept, a planimplemented by Sir Gerald Templer. From 1961 to 1965, the year in which hereceived his knighthood, Thompson would be the main architect of early Americancounter-insurgency strategy in Vietnam as Head of the British Advisory Mission (73).Thompson's books on his experiences of counter-insurgency in Malaya and inVietnam were published by Forum World Features. He would also arrange for theISC's initial grants from Shell and BP. The second leading counter-insurgency expertwas another old Malaya hand, Major-General Sir Richard Clutterbuck, who wasSenior Army Instructor at the Royal College of Defence Studies when he joined theISC Council (74). The early ISC Council also included Brigadier W. F. K. Thompson,the military correspondent of the Daily Telegraph from 1959 to 1976. Another seniormilitary figure who would later join the ISC Council was General Sir Harry Tuzo,General Officer Commanding Northern Ireland from 1971 to 1973 and DeputySupreme Allied Commander, Europe from 1976 to 1978.Through these extensive contacts with the British security establishment, theISC gained a unique rôle as an unofficial (deniable) but powerful propaganda tool,which could put over the intelligence community's views to the Press under theguise of a 'neutral' academic research body. It could also take over some of thenetworking with private bodies that IRD had recently abandoned. As Crozier reports,by the end of the 1960s, IRD had "decided to sever all relations with two majorcontinental networks with which I had been associated. One was the Hague-basedINTERDOC group. The other was admittedly more controversial. This was a privatebut highly effective French group controlled by a friend of mine, the late GeorgesAlbertini. ... In return for all information and the contacts he gave me, I made surethat he received the IRD output, of which he made good use. ... There was noquestion of restoring these official contacts, however, once they had been broken. Inany case, INTERDOC's value had decreased sharply after the advent of Willy Brandtas Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany in September 1969. As forAlbertini, whom I met frequently in Paris or London, I made sure both that hereceived IRD material likely to be useful to him, and that I made good use of his owninformation and influence" (75). Albertini's influence would indeed be of use toCrozier, particularly after the presidential election of June 1969 when Albertini's oldschoolmate and Bilderberg member Georges Pompidou replaced Général de Gaulle.The ISC also developed excellent relations with four private anti-unionblacklisting groups: the Economic League, Common Cause, Aims for Industry andthe Industrial Research and Information Service (IRIS). In 1970, whilst the ISCwas being established, Crozier had edited the anti-communist anthology We WillBury You, published by Common Cause. Alongside Neil Elles of Common Cause andJohn Dettmer of the Economic League, the authors included Charles Ellis ofINTERDOC and two founding members of the ISC, Crozier and Brigadier W. F. K.Thompson. This early joint venture was the first in a series of collaborative effortsthroughout the 1970s and 1980s; Aims for Industry and IRIS, in particular, wouldwork with the ISC during their counter-subversion campaigns.Besides its intelligence and industrial allies, the ISC also gained considerablepolitical support, particularly in the favourable political climate following the electionvictory of the Conservatives under Edward Heath in June 1970. The main politicalgroup echoing the ISC's concerns on Communist subversion was the Monday Club,a ginger group within the Conservative Party which included many Members ofParliament, several of whom were intelligence veterans.THE MONDAY CLUB AND SIFThe Monday Club had been set up within the Conservative party in 1961 tobring together defendants of South Africa and White Rhodesia who opposed the newdecolonisation policy announced by Conservative Prime Minister Harold Macmillanin his "winds of change" speech. One of the earliest members of the Monday Club,joining in 1962, was Sir John Biggs-Davison, a Conservative MP from 1955 untilhis death in 1988. From at least 1965 on, Biggs-Davison served on the PEU CentralCouncil with Vice-President Otto von Habsburg and the PEU International EventsSecretary and future Belgian coordinator of the Cercle complex, FlorimondDamman, described in the next chapter (76). A stalwart in the Monday Club, Biggs-Davison would serve as its President from 1974 to 1976.Another Monday Club member with links to the Cercle complex – indeed afuture Chairman of the Cercle Pinay itself - was Julian (Lord) Amery. Amery was aprominent MP on the Conservative Right with a long history of extensive intelligencecontacts. Having served in the Balkans with MI6's Section D and the SpecialOperations Executive (SOE) during the war, he was one of the major figures thatpushed MI6 in the immediate post-war period to adopt its disastrous plan "toliberate the countries within the Soviet orbit by any means short of war", notably thecatastrophic attempts to "set the Soviet Union ablaze" by landing armed bands ofémigrés in Albania, Latvia, the Caucasus and the Ukraine. In June 1950, Ameryattended the founding conference in Berlin of the CIA-funded CCF and served on itsInternational Steering Committee (77); at the time, Amery was also one of the leadingmembers of the Central and Eastern Europe Commission of Retinger's CIA-fundedEuropean Movement. The same year, Amery was elected to Parliament and alsomarried Harold Macmillan's daughter. He went on to hold several government postsunder Macmillan, firstly as Under-Secretary of State at the War Office in 1957 andthe Colonial Office in 1958, before being promoted to the post of Secretary of Statefor Air from 1960 to 1962; he would then serve in the Cabinet as Minister for Airuntil the Conservatives' electoral defeat by Labour's Harold Wilson in 1964. Ameryhad joined the Monday Club soon after its creation in 1961; he was the guest ofhonour at the Club's annual dinner in 1963. In 1966, he would lose hisparliamentary seat but regain it in 1969, remaining MP until 1992, when he wascreated a life peer. By the time of the ISC's creation in 1970, the political pendulumhad just swung back to the Right. New Conservative Prime Minister Edward Heathappointed Amery Housing Minister, where he served until 1972 when he becameMinister for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (the cover department for MI6),holding the post until Heath's defeat by Wilson in 1974 (78).Another Monday Club associate was Amery's Private Secretary as HousingMinister, Winston Churchill. Churchill's father Randolph had been one of thefounding members of the SAS and a life-long intimate of SAS co-founder DavidStirling, who would contribute to the counter-subversion campaign of the mid-1970s by founding the citizens' militia GB75 in 1974.One of Amery's oldest political allies in the Monday Club was Rhodesian-bornSir Stephen Hastings. During the war, Hastings had served with Stirling in NorthAfrica as one of the founding members of the SAS before moving to SOE and thenMI6; he would be stationed in Cyprus at the same time as Peter Wright of MI5.Hastings was a close friend of Christopher Phillpotts of MI6 - the two had servedtogether in Paris. As Head of MI6 Counter-Espionage, Phillpotts would workextensively with MI5's Peter Wright in the molehunts of the late 1960s. Having leftMI6, Hastings became a Conservative MP in 1960; his first appearance in the Houseof Commons was sponsored by Amery, then Aviation Minister. Hastings would thenjoin Amery in the Monday Club as one of the Club's eleven MPs in 1963. In 1965,Amery and Hastings would campaign with newly elected Conservative MP CranleyOnslow against the cancellation of the TSR2 aircraft. Onslow shared Hastings' andAmery's intelligence connections, having served in MI6 until 1960; he would workbriefly for the IRD before being elected to Parliament in 1964, remaining MP until1997.Another early member of the Monday Club from 1964 on was GeoffreyStewart-Smith, later a Conservative MP from 1970 to 1974. In 1962, Stewart-Smithhad founded the Foreign Affairs Circle, the British section of WACL until 1974,which produced the hardline anti-Soviet journal East-West Digest, a fortnightlypublication sent free of charge to all MPs. Stewart-Smith's journal East-West Digestwould appear to be one of the last outlets created around INTERDOC following thefoundation in the late fifties of the Deutsche Vereinigung für Ost-West Beziehungenin Germany, the Oost-West Stichting in Holland, the Schweizer Ost-Institut inSwitzerland and Albertini's Est-Ouest magazine in France. Stewart-Smith would latercreate the Foreign Affairs Publishing Company (FAPC), which continued the East-West Digest and published many works by Crozier and other figures on the BritishRight. The FAPC also distributed the publications of the British anti-union groups(Aims for Industry, Common Cause, the Economic League and IRIS) and acted asagent for the SOI's press in Switzerland, SOI-Verlag, and for INTERDOC in Holland(79).Last and very definitely not least amongst the Monday Club members wasGeorge Kennedy Young, a veteran MI6 coup-master closely involved with MI6'sAlbanian landings in the immediate post war period, strongly supported by Amery.Unfortunately for all concerned, the top MI6 officer in charge of liaison with the CIAfor the operation was Kim Philby, who promptly blew it to the KGB. Young was alsonotably involved with Project Ajax, the coup against Mossadeq in Iran in 1953, theyear that Young would be promoted to Deputy Chief of MI6. Young retired early in1961 and joined Kleinwort Benson, the merchant bankers.Young was brought into the Monday Club by Biggs-Davison in 1967, and waslargely responsible for the Monday Club's rapid lurch to the extreme Right,particularly on the issues of immigration and subversion. In 1969, the Monday Clubpublished Young's Who Goes Home, an anti-immigration pamphlet that stirred upcontroversy due to its call for mandatory repatriation of black people. Besidesrunning the Halt Immigration Now Campaign from within the Monday Club, Youngchaired the Monday Club Action Fund, which he used to pay for his supporters towork in Monday Club regional offices. In short, as a trained intelligence officer,Young planted his cadres throughout the Monday Club's national and regionalgroups; an ally of Young's, Bee Carthew, controlled the administrative structure ofthe Monday Club as Meetings Secretary (80).The Monday Club Subversion Committee was chaired by another associate ofYoung's, Ian Greig, one of the four founding members of the Monday Club inJanuary 1961 and a close partner of the ISC and Crozier throughout the 1970s. InJanuary 1970, Greig's Committee organized a Monday Club seminar on subversion,at which the panel included Greig, Young, Charles Lyons of the FBI and the ISC's SirRobert Thompson. Young and Greig's preoccupation with subversion was certainlyshared by the main speaker at the Monday Club's seminar: General Giovanni DeLorenzo, former head of SIFAR and of the Carabinieri and main actor in the aborted1964 coup attempt, Plan Solo. De Lorenzo, now an MSI MP, had been invited byYoung, who was an expert on Italian fascist policing methods, having dismantled theGerman intelligence service's networks in Italy for MI6 after the war. De Lorenzo’sspeech to the Monday Club came midway between the beginning of the strategy oftension in April 1969 and the Borghese coup in December 1970; at the time of hisvisit, De Lorenzo was also a key figure in an anti-communist resistance networkwithin the Carabinieri and the secret services codenamed Rosa dei Venti (CompassRose), which had been set up after the failure of Plan Solo. The Rosa dei Venti group,a major component in the Italian Gladio network, would later be implicated in afurther coup planned for the spring of 1973 (81).As the same time as he was taking over the Monday Club, G. K. Young wastightening his grip on another right-wing group, the Society for IndividualFreedom, formed by the fusion of two other groups in 1942. By 1970, Young hadsucceeded in becoming Chairman of SIF; the remaining posts on the NationalExecutive were filled by Young's allies, such as Biggs-Davison and Gerald Howarth,a Conservative MP and member of Young's Monday Club Immigration Committee.Other associates of Young's on the SIF National Executive included Michael Ivens,Director of the anti-union outfit Aims for Industry from 1970 on, and RossMcWhirter; Ross and his brother Norris were veteran figures on the British ultrarightand publishers of the Guinness Book of Records. Another member of the SIFNational Executive member was Sir John Rodgers, Conservative MP from 1950 to1979 who became SIF President in the summer of 1970; we shall meet Rodgersagain later as a member of CEDI and the AESP (82).A final SIF National Executive member was the Conservative MP Sir FredericBennett, who acted as Chairman of the SIF Parliamentary Committee. Bennett wasSenior Director of the Kleinwort Benson bank alongside G. K. Young, and also aDirector at Commercial Union Assurance, where he worked with another retired MI6officer with long experience in the Middle East, Ellis Morgan. Bennett would laterassist Young in creating the 'private army' Unison in 1976. Besides being a close allyof Young's, Bennett was also a member of the Bilderberg Group and attended theApril 1974 Bilderberg conference in Megèze together with the President of KleinwortBenson, Gerald Thompson (83). Bennett's importance within the Bilderberg groupcan be judged by the fact that Bennett was chosen as host for their 1977 conference,crucial for the restoration of the Bilderbergers' tarnished reputation after theLockheed bribe scandal which led to the cancellation of their 1976 conference andthe resignation of the Bilderberg President, Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands. Theconference, organized in the UK to commemorate the Jubilee, was held in Bennett'sconstituency of Torquay in April (84).In 1970-71, SIF was active in opposing demonstrations led by Young LiberalPeter Hain protesting against sporting tours in the UK by South African teams: onephotograph illustrating a SIF action shows Young, Howarth, Biggs-Davison andMcWhirter carrying an urn of "ashes of English liberty". In 1971, SIF set up the HainProsecution Fund which raised £20,000; its Chairman was Ross McWhirter, itsTreasurer Howarth. A valuable partner of SIF's in support of their actions againstanti-apartheid demonstrators was the South African Bureau of State Security(BOSS). Gordon Winter, one of BOSS's key agents in London working underjournalistic cover (including seven years for FWF), had regular meetings withHowarth to coordinate BOSS/SIF collaboration. Winter was cautious about SIFhowever, as his BOSS handler had informed him that SIF was a British intelligencefront run by two senior British intelligence operatives - Young and McWhirter. OnYoung, the information was certainly right.As a journalist, Winter had attended all of the matchs during the Springboks'tour with the task of photographing the demonstrators for BOSS files. Winter thenoffered Howarth over one thousand mug-shots of the demonstrators as well as his60-page report for BOSS on the tour and Hain's anti-apartheid campaign. Winteralso offered to stand as the main witness in SIF's private prosecution of Hain, butwithdrew at the last moment on orders from BOSS, who wanted him to maintain hiscover for a much more important task - the ultimately successful attempt to smearLiberal leader Jeremy Thorpe (85). BOSS did not give up on Hain however, using adouble in an attempt to frame him for a bank robbery in Putney in October 1975. Amonth before Hain's trial, he escaped a letter-bomb posted from Vienna, and thecase against him was ultimately dismissed (86).FLORIMOND DAMMAN AND THE AESPAt the same time as the IRD and FWF were organising their new Instituteunder Brian Crozier, Jean Violet was working to provide a new logistical basis for theCercle Pinay and for the political alliance of Pinay, Strauss, Habsburg and SanchezBella. The man chosen for this crucial support rôle was a longstanding Belgiancontact of Habsburg's - Florimond Damman. Damman was a key Belgian linkman;together with a few close friends, Damman represented the Belgian end of almost allthe international right-wing networks such as the PEU, CEDI and WACL. Dammanhad been a close associate of Habsburg's since at least 1962, when Damman servedas Secretary of the Belgian PEU section, Action pour l'Europe Nouvelle etl'Expansion Atlantique (AENA), before rising to become Chairman of theInternational Events Committee on the Central Council of the PEU in 1966 alongsidePEU Vice-Presidents Habsburg and Biggs-Davison, PEU International SecretaryVittorio Pons and Pons’ deputy and Damman's close associate, Belgian BaronBernard de Marcken de Merken.Damman's chairmanship of the PEU International Events Committee reflectedhis ceaseless energy in organizing and networking amongst the European Right. Oneparticular form this took was the organisation of banquets, Grand CharlemagneDinners as Damman called them, to bring together representatives and personalitiesfrom the fragmented paneuropean movements. Starting in the early 1960s, thesedinners were organized in Brussels or Aachen by Damman and the Belgian PEUsection; the renamed Conseil Belge pour l'Union Paneuropéenne would hold the IXthGrand Charlemagne Dinner in Brussels in January 1966 in the presence of "HisImperial and Royal Highness Archduke Otto von Habsburg". By 1969, the BelgianPEU group would again change name to become the Mouvement d'Action pourl'Union Européenne (MAUE), but would still be run by Damman who also liaisedwith the Habsburg-Sanchez Bella group CEDI, being close personal friends withSanchez Bella (87).The Belgian section of CEDI was run by Damman's close associate PaulVankerkhoven, who served on CEDI's International Council and also acted asDamman's Vice-President within the PEU section MAUE. 1969 would be a watershedyear for the two men who would set up a series of right-wing groups that year,amongst them the Belgian section of WACL, the Ligue Internationale de la Liberté(LIL), founded by Vankerkhoven. The same year, Vankerkhoven also set up a selectright-wing club, the Cercle des Nations, which became a frequent meeting place formembers of the PEU, CEDI and WACL (88). In April 1970, for example, Damman andVankerkhoven would organize a Cercle des Nations reception in honour of the Greekcolonels; another collaborative venture for Damman and Vankerkhoven was the jointorganization of the 1970 Brussels Congress of the Anti-Bolshevik Block of Nations(ABN), an anti-communist group of mainly Ukrainian exiles financed by the CIA andthe BND. The ABN was also strongly supported by Strauss's CSU; its headquarterswere in Munich (89).Of greatest interest though for the Cercle complex was another club, set up byFlorimond Damman in January 1969, the Académie Européenne des SciencesPolitiques (AESP). Damman was Secretary-for-life of the AESP; Paul Vankerkhovenserved as a member of the AESP organizing core, the Permanent Delegation. TheAESP would continue the tradition of organizing the Grand Charlemagne Dinnersand act as a right-wing clearing house, as Damman described in his note 229:"Everywhere in Europe, there are people who share our ideology and who areunable to contribute to it because they are, and above all, they feel, isolated.The same applies to the small, restricted and regional groups which arejealous of their independence and their individuality, and we have to allowthem that. We should not impose a line of conduct on them, we shouldsuggest certain initiatives to them, but also find a way of bringing togethertheir leaders on a individual basis, setting up permanent liaison betweenthem without giving them the impression that they are linked, consult themfor certain missions and make them believe that they have taken the initiativein giving us their approval" (90).Besides bringing together the fragmented forces of national right-wing groups,another intention behind the fledgling Academy was to absorb the othertransnational European right-wing movements, particularly CEDI and the PEU.Whilst these two organizations would continue to exist, the AESP would act as aforum for a meeting of minds between fractions within both international groups.This goal of integrating the movements working for European union was in part dueto a latent power struggle between political positions and personalities in Europeanfederalism.Within the PEU-AESP complex, the struggle was one which opposed PEUfounder and 'dove' Comte Coudenhove Kalergi with CEDI founder and 'hawk'Archduke Otto von Habsburg. The 1969 creation of the AESP may well have beeninitially intended as a means of stripping the PEU of its more influential membersand sidelining Coudenhove Kalergi, a move rendered unnecessary by CoudenhoveKalergi's death on 27th July, 1972, which cleared the way for Habsburg to becomePresident of all three organizations - the PEU, CEDI and the AESP. In 1969,however, it seems that Coudenhove Kalergi could not be ousted immediately - hisprestige could do much to gain acceptance for the new Academy, and so it wasdecided to at least start up the AESP with Coudenhove Kalergi as honoraryPresident.Before the latent power struggle between Coudenhove Kalergi and Otto vonHabsburg within both the PEU and the AESP had been resolved, Damman hadconsidered setting up another group to replace the AESP if Coudenhove Kalergiwould not give way to Habsburg. Damman had already started the groundwork for anew group, CREC, to be run by Damman and a new ally, Yves Guérin-Sérac, leaderof the revolutionary fascist group, Aginter Press, founded in Lisbon in September1966.It is possible that Guérin-Sérac saw the new group CREC as an opportunity toprovide Aginter Press's international fascist contact network, Ordre et Tradition, withlinks to top conservative politicians, a bridge between the revolutionary fascistunderground and 'respectable' public figures, whilst at the same time pursuing thestrategy of tension that Aginter Press had developed. After an initial contact in late1968, Guérin-Sérac came to Brussels in January 1969 as Damman's guest todevelop contacts amongst the elite conservative circles Damman frequented.Damman started by inviting Guérin-Sérac to the AESP's XIIth Grand CharlemagneDinner on 27th January, 1969, just four months before the Milan bomb blast thatlaunched the Italian strategy of tension. Amongst the illustrious guests wereHabsburg and Belgian Prime Minister Gaston Eyskens; one of Guérin-Sérac'sdinner companions at table G was the Belgian neo-fascist Emile Lecerf, later tobecome notorious in connection with rumours of a planned coup in 1973 and astrategy of tension in Belgium in the 1980s.Guérin-Sérac soon became involved in the internal power struggle within theAESP between Count Richard Coudenhove Kalergi and Archduke Otto vonHabsburg. In a letter to Damman on Ordre et Tradition headed paper dated 26thMarch 1969, Yves Guérin-Sérac gave the following description of the power strugglebetween Coudenhove Kalergi and Habsburg three months after the AESP’s creation:"Dear Mr. Damman,Thank you for your kind letters of the 19th and 20th March which bring mehere at the extreme tip of the continent [Portugal] the reviving spirit ofEuropean aspirations from the very heart of Europe!If I may give my opinion, I also feel that the maximum effort should be givento the Academy and the College [of Young European Leaders, an AESP youthoffshoot], because it is from here that the most active and dynamic elementswill come. However, and you are right on this as well, so as to create thenecessary climate, we must contact a wider and more diversified elite.Removing the Count and replacing him with the Archduke is a solution, but ifit turns out to be impossible, I feel it is logical to think of setting up anotherorganization"(91).By the summer of 1969, Guérin-Sérac and Damman had concluded an"agreement in principle" to found the new group, CREC, which would try andreconcile two conflicting positions: the traditional Right, anti-communist but notanti-parliamentarian, and the revolutionary extreme Right represented by AginterPress. Guérin-Sérac and Damman then met at least twice more, as detailed in aprogress report written by Guérin-Sérac on 19th May, 1969 and sent out by AginterPress to their correspondents:"We should take stock of the progress made in our effort to set up CREC. Imust admit that little progress has been made since the beginning of the year,i.e. since the agreement in principle on the two syntheses ... the majorreasons for this delay are:- the difficulties suffered by the group of our Italian friends as a result of thechaotic and revolutionary situation in their country;- the centrifugal tendencies of the French group, whose reconversion has notyet been completed.... We should not however give up. In a Franco-Belgian preparatory meetingheld in Brussels in March, we agreed on the following work programme:A - Definition of basic political positions with regard to European union.B - Definition of goals and strategy.C - Organization of a structure for CREC: bases and statutes.D - Preparation of a political plan and a psychological plan to be implementedby CREC.E - Organization of a financial committee.In the meeting in Vienna at the beginning of this month, it was suggested wedrew up a questionnaire so as to facilitate the definition, classification andalignment of the political ideas held by the various groups active on thesubject of European union. Please find annexed a questionnaire coveringparagraphs A and B of the above plan.I would suggest you send me your answers and any points you would like toadd. I will then prepare a summary and if necessary highlight the conflicts ormajor disagreements and try to find an acceptable compromise with thoseconcerned before finally submitting the conclusions to you" (92).In his report, Guérin-Sérac refers to the "chaotic and revolutionary situation"in Italy, a climate stoked by the Italian correspondents of Aginter Press, centredaround the Avanguardia Nazionale group under the leadership of Stefano delleChiaie. Almost exactly one month after Guérin-Sérac wrote to Damman about CRECin March 1969, the Italian neo-fascists working with Aginter Press carried out thebomb attack that announced the beginning of the strategy of tension in Italy. Thebomb that exploded in the Fiat Pavilion at the Milan Fair on the 25th April 1969wounded twenty people; by the end of this first year of terror tactics, 149 bombattacks would occur, as compared to fifty in the four years from 1964 to 1968.Whether Damman knew of Guérin-Sérac's terrorist connections or not isuncertain, but it is clear that Aginter Press's neo-fascist terrorists were in contactwith conservatives throughout Europe, as Guérin-Sérac explained:"Our troop consists of two types of men:i) officers who joined us after the fighting in Indo-China or Algeria, and evensome who signed on with us after the battle for Korea;ii) intellectuals who, during the same period, turned their attention to thestudy of the techniques of Marxist subversion ... having created study groups,they shared their experience to try and expose the techniques of Marxistsubversion and develop a counter-strategy. Throughout this period, we hadsystematically forged close ties with like-minded groups that were being setup in Italy, Belgium, Germany, Spain or in Portugal with the aim of formingthe nucleus of a truly European league to resist Marxism" (93).In an 1974 interview, Aginter Press’ key Italian representative, GuidoGiannettini, alluded to the contacts between Ordre et Tradition and groups like theAESP and specifically mentioned one of the main contacts for the Academy and forAginter Press, Franz Josef Strauss's CSU party (94):"I passed my information on to some friends in certain milieux of theinternational Right. They passed me theirs ... the practical form for thisexchange was private bulletins which circulated amongst certain Europeangroups of the Centre-Right ... such as, for example, the Bavarian CSU party,the French 'geopolitical groups' [e.g. the Cercle Pinay], and other groups inBelgium [e.g. the AESP], Switzerland, and almost every country in Europe"(95).Despite Guérin-Sérac's interest in the new group, CREC never got beyond theplanning stage. Nonetheless, journalist Serge Dumont who infiltrated the AESP atthe time states that contacts between Damman and Guérin-Sérac continued untilMay 1974 when the Lisbon offices of Aginter Press were occupied by left-wingsoldiers during the Portuguese revolution, blowing the operation's press agencycover (96). There was however one person who would not forget Guérin-Sérac'sinsurrectionary message - his table companion at Damman's Grand CharlemagneDinner in January 1969, Belgian neo-fascist Emile Lecerf. In 1973, the names ofLecerf and several eminent members of Damman's Academy would be included in aGendarmerie report on plans for a coup d'état in Belgium, detailed in a later chapter.Despite the failure of the CREC project, Damman would soon overcome theinternal struggle within the AESP and expand its activities. At a symposiumorganized by Habsburg in Vienna in May 1969, Damman met Jean Violet (97). ByOctober, Violet was looking for a group that could provide an operational frameworkfor the Cercle Pinay, and thought of Damman and his AESP. On 21st October 1969,Violet wrote to Damman saying that he would like to meet him, having been"mandated by President Pinay to carry out a study of European perspectives afterthe German elections" i.e. Willy Brandt's September election victory.The meeting took place one week later on 28th October in Brussels, whereViolet was accompanied by two of his contacts, the first of whom was Marcel Collet,who had just retired as director of Euratom. Violet's second companion was certainto ensure a favourable reception from Damman - none other than the InternationalSecretary-General of the Paneuropean Union, Vittorio Pons. Over lunch, Violet,Damman, Collet and Pons agreed on a new rôle for the AESP to act as a forumlinking the PEU and CEDI under Habsburg and Sanchez Bella to the BilderbergGroup and Cercle Pinay, represented by Pinay and Violet. The revamped Academywould be run by Damman directed from behind the scenes by Violet and his trio ofassociates Collet, Father Dubois and François Vallet, an industrialist inpharmaceuticals. Violet announced that he would go to Pöcking, Habsburg's seatjust outside Munich, to confer with the Archduke and Strauss about the financing ofthe AESP.Within eight months of the Academy's relaunch, the process of interlinkingwas already well under way, as a membership list dated 21st June 1970 testifies(98). The honorary figurehead of the AESP was PEU founder Coudenhove Kalergi,but the position was only symbolic: as on all future AESP documents, Archduke Ottovon Habsburg's name is first on the list of names, whereas Coudenhove Kalergi'sname appears only in third place under the letter C. The PEU/CEDI axis wasrepresented by Habsburg, Sanchez Bella and Pons, the Cercle Pinay by Pinay, Violet,Father Dubois, Pesenti and Collet.The operational core of the AESP, the Permanent Delegation, brought togetherthe Belgian sections of the PEU, CEDI and WACL - the duo of Damman and deMarcken represented the PEU Central Council and the Belgian PEU section MAUE,whereas Vankerkhoven ran the Belgian WACL section LIL and the Belgian section ofCEDI. CEDI's Belgian section was also represented within the AESP by theChevalier Marcel de Roover, a veteran anti-communist who had played a majorpart in the early post-war creation of two private anti-communist intelligenceservices linked to the Belgian Gladio network, Milpol and the Delcourt network. Itwas de Roover who had founded the Belgian section of CEDI in 1961 and still servedas its President when the AESP was created; he was also Belgium's representativewithin WACL from the late 1950s on. Following de Roover's death in 1971, his WACLpost was taken over by Paul Vankerkhoven, who was also appointed Secretary-General of CEDI, moving CEDI's offices into his Cercle des Nations (99).The most prominent Belgian members of the AESP however were the BelgianPrime Minister, Gaston Eyskens, and the future Belgian Prime Minister and DefenceMinister throughout most of the 1970s, Paul Vanden Boeynants. VdB, as he isknown, would become a national institution in Belgian political life, the BelgianAndreotti. VdB first entered politics at the age of 29 in the ranks of Retinger'sEuropean Movement. Before being elected to Parliament, he served as one of the fiveBelgian representatives at the second conference of the Union of EuropeanFederalists, the most powerful group within the European Movement. The UEF'ssecond conference was held in Rome in November 1948 shortly after massiveintervention by the CIA to ward off an electoral victory by the Socialist-CommunistPopular Democratic Front in the April 1948 elections. As we will see below, one keyItalian politician in this anti-communist propaganda effort would also figure amongstthe AESP's members in 1970.Through the UEF, Vanden Boeynants made a valuable contact in the personof the UEF Treasurer, the Belgian Pierre Bonvoisin, who in 1952 would be one of thefounding members of the Bilderberg Group with Antoine Pinay. When VdB wasBelgian Defence Minister in the mid-1970s, he would show his gratitude to PierreBonvoisin by appointing Bonvoisin's son, Benoît, as his political adviser. BaronBenoît de Bonvoisin was at the time the most notorious patron of Belgian fascismand a key international linkman for the far Right.Alongside the international leadership of the PEU and CEDI and its Belgianaffiliates, the newly founded Academy also included three top members of theGerman PEU section, the most influential of the national delegations. The first ofthis trio of German AESP members was a man we have already met, the conservativebag-man and German PEU Federal Secretary until 1975 Karl-Friedrich Grau,longstanding coordinator of the Frankfurt Study Group and German partner ofSager’s Swiss SOI. Grau would be one of Damman's major partners in the early1970s; Damman's private diary reveals at least 25 meetings with Grau from 1969 to1973, as well as joint plans to set up a certain 'Collège de Coordination' in Colognewith Grau as President (100).Throughout the 1970s, Grau’s Frankfurt Study Group would be a key sourceof German anti-communist propaganda via its private newsletter entitled interninformationen.Although the Study Group produced the bulletin, the legalpublication address was that of a Swiss affiliate - putting Grau and the bulletin'scontributors out of the reach of German law, and for good reason: the bulletin,which included contributions from BND officers, regularly published defamatoryarticles about Centre-Left politicians (101). As one of the founding members put it inan interview with Swiss television, "the Swiss branch was set up to ensure that theleft-wing German government [under Willy Brandt] can't touch us". Grau gave asimilar explanation during a meeting with militants of the neo-fascist NPD party inDecember 1973: "We have compiled lists of Socialists, Reds and trades unionists. Tobe certain that only authorized people can get at them, we have deposited them in avault in Switzerland" (102).Grau's Swiss affiliate, the Internationale Studiengesellschaft für Politik(International Study Group for Politics, ISP) was founded in Interlaken in 1971 andwas funded by a grant of 10% of the Frankfurt Study Group's income. Throughoutthe 1970s, the ISP would act as a major German-language outlet for Cold Warpropaganda, in many ways similar to the British Institute for the Study of Conflict.With participants and speakers coming from the military, the police and theintelligence and security services of Switzerland and other European countries, theISP held conferences on Soviet subversion of Western society: typical titles ofspeeches included "Is the Bolchevisation of Europe inevitable?" and "The threat ofGerman reunification - under the hammer and sickle!".Considerable support for the ISP was given by Dr. Peter Sager and his SOI.For many years, Grau's smear sheet intern-informationen was produced by a printingcompany that belonged to Sager. Sager himself spoke frequently at ISP conferencesin the 1970s, and the Secretary-General of the ISP from 1973 on was Sager's partnerHeinz Luginbühl. Support for the ISP was also given by Habsburg and the AESP: theAustrian Archduke gave speeches and contributed articles to the Frankfurt StudyGroup from 1965 onwards, and several other German or Swiss members of the AESPwould work as speakers for the ISP in the mid-1970s.Alongside Grau, another German who joined the AESP in 1970 was Hans-Joachim von Merkatz, a senior CDU politician first elected to the GermanParliament in 1949 as a member of the small Deutsche Partei (German Party). VonMerkatz served in the Cabinet (alongside Strauss) as Minister for Senate Affairs from1955 to 1962, and simultaneously as Justice Minister from 1956 to 1957. He wouldswitch party allegiance to the CDU in 1960 and served a second simultaneousmandate from 1960 to 1961 as Minister for Expellees, Refugees and War Victims –the former German populations expelled from the Eastern European countriesbehind the Iron Curtain were a notable factor in post-war German politics. Leavingnational politics in 1962, von Merkatz served as German representative on theExecutive Council of UNESCO from 1964 to 1968.More significant than von Merkatz's political career was his rôle inpaneuropean politics. In 1967, he had replaced Coudenhove Kalergi as the Presidentof the German PEU section, serving on the PEU Central Council as Vice-President.This succession was the first victory for the Habsburg fraction of the PEU to whichvon Merkatz belonged; von Merkatz was also Vice-President of Habsburg's CEDI anda member of an institute that shared CEDI's Munich headquarters, theEuropäisches Institut für politische, wirtschaftliche und soziale Fragen (EuropeanInstitute for political, economic and social issues). As we will see later on, vonMerkatz would also serve on the Boards of several other organizations within theCercle Pinay complex.The third German member of the AESP in 1970 was Brussels-based RudolfDumont du Voitel, a Board member of the German PEU section. Dumont du Voitelwould be involved in the running of the AESP as a member of the core group, thePermanent Delegation; he would also give the AESP access to the EuropeanCommunity and the media thanks to his position as Head of the AudiovisualDivision of the EEC.Franco's government in Spain was also well represented in the AESP in 1970.CEDI co-founder Alfredo Sanchez Bella was, of course, one of the AESP foundingmembers; at this time, he had just taken over as Franco's Minister for Informationand Tourism, a post he would fill until 1973. Also on the 1970 membership list ofthe AESP was his immediate predecessor as Minister of Information and Tourismbetween 1962 and 1969, Manuel Fraga Iribarne, whom we have already met as acontact of Brian Crozier's from 1965 on (103).If the Spanish members of the AESP are of interest, one French member is noless so: in the 1970 AESP membership list, André Voisin is credited as an adviser inthe French Prime Minister's Private Office. Voisin however had other connections notmentioned by the AESP: he was one of the earliest collaborators of Dr JosephRetinger, founder of the European Movement and the Bilderberg Group. Voisin wasVice-President of the European Movement, and therefore provided the AESP with achannel for contacts between the PEU and the EM. Voisin was also one of thefounding members of the Bilderberg Group, having attended the meeting inSeptember 1952 which decided to create the powerbrokers' forum alongside withAntoine Pinay and Pierre Bonvoisin.On top of the Academy's early contacts in Belgium, Germany and France, anItalian member of the Academy in 1970 is of note: Ivan-Matteo Lombardo.Lombardo, a textile industrialist and director of several American companies in Italy,had been one of the most prominent politicians in the immediate post-war period,serving as the Italian Ambassador Extraordinary who negotiated post-warreparations with the American government in 1947. The same year, Lombardo asSecretary-General of the Socialist Party worked with future Italian PresidentGiuseppe Saragat to oppose a Socialist-Communist electoral alliance, leaving theSocialist Party to form the right-wing PSLI (later PSDI); he subsequently served asMinister for Industry, Commerce and Foreign Trade in de Gasperi's coalitiongovernment elected in April 1948 after massive intervention by the CIA (104). Atleast one of Lombardo's electoral campaigns was financed by the American StateDepartment; he would later cross the Atlantic as Italian Ambassador to Washington.Lombardo was a frequent participant at conferences on the defence of Europeagainst Soviet subversion: in December 1960, he served with Pinay and Albertini onthe Sponsors' Committee of the "International Conference on Soviet PoliticalWarfare" organized by the French section of WACL (105). Lombardo was also closelyconnected to WACL via his rôle as President of the Comitato per la Liberta d'Europa,the Italian section of the European Freedom Council. The EFC shared its offices inZeppelinstrasse 67 in Munich with the ABN which had intimate links with WACL(106); in 1971, Lombardo would contribute the foreword to a book by the ABNcondemning Russian colonialism.Within Italy, Lombardo defended American interests as President of theComitato Italiano Atlantico and Vice-President of the Atlantic Treaty Associationwhich in 1965 called for the carabinieri and Italian police to be given powers tointervene in Italian domestic politics to protect the NATO Alliance. The same year,Lombardo would be one of the speakers at the Parco dei Principi conference thatgave birth to the strategy of tension. In his contribution, "The Communist Waragainst the West", he called for "universal counter-guerrilla warfare". At this stage,he evidently had considerable international outreach - the closing speaker at theParco dei Principi meeting, Colonel Adriano Magi-Braschi, mentioned that he had"had pleasure in meeting Mr. Lombardo in the most diverse parts of the world". Aspart of this ambassadorial rôle for counter-guerrilla warfare, Lombardo also attendeda later conference on "Unconventional Warfare and Defence" held in June 1971. In1974, according to the Italian Press, he would be implicated in the Sogno coup (107).To sum up this overview of the Academy afforded by the June 1970membership list, we can see that only eight months after its relaunch, the Academyhad succeeded in bringing together the leadership of the PEU, CEDI, EuropeanMovement and the expanded Cercle Pinay, including all the key personalitiesinvolved in conservative campaigns for European Union. Internationally, it could callon friends in high places who belonged to the Bilderberg group. On a Europeanpolitical level, the Academy's members included former or serving Ministers fromBelgium, France, Germany, Italy and Spain; at the same time, behind the scenes,the AESP shared common ground with Aginter Press and its terrorist army.THE SNIFFER PLANE PROJECTAt the same time as Damman and Violet were busy setting a new foundationfor the AESP, they were also working on the trials and marketing of "an incredibletechnological breakthrough" - the ability to detect underground liquid deposits fromthe air. The procedure had been developed by the Italian Aldo Bonassoli workingwith the Belgian Alain Comte de Villegas. De Villegas was no stranger to Damman;his elder brother Diego de Villegas was married to Damman's sister, and Alain deVillegas himself was a member of the AESP Permanent Delegation, the inner circlethat dealt with AESP business. At the end of 1969, the three AESP core membersDamman, de Marcken and de Villegas met Violet at the Westbury hotel in Brusselsto discuss how to proceed with the sniffer plane project. De Marcken attended themeeting as he had been involved in an earlier project of de Villegas and Bonassoli's,a water desalination plant which had been tested on a holiday campsite on Ibiza thatbelonged to de Marcken.The crucial question was to get an impressive first contract for field trials tohelp secure funding. After an abortive attempt to obtain financing for the projectfrom an American industrialist, Crosby Kelly, de Villegas visited the SpanishEmbassy on 6th April 1970 to lunch with Ambassador La Orden, a member of OpusDei and fellow founding member of the AESP; La Orden had been Sanchez Bella'stop civil servant as Director-General of Information and Tourism. Sanchez Bella'srôle as Minister for Tourism allowed him to promote de Villegas' scheme: de Villegasflew out to the Canaries in December 1970 with a contract to discover undergroundsources of drinking water on a site belonging to Entursa, the Spanish TourismAgency.The financing was also provided thanks to a longstanding client of Violet'swhom we have already met as delle Chiaie's backer - Carlo Pesenti, "that mostCatholic of financiers" who ran one of Italy's largest industrial conglomerates,Italcementi, inherited from his uncle whose close contacts with Mussolini had giventhe firm privileged access to contracts for concrete in Italian-occupied Ethiopia. Afterthe war, Pesenti would expand his business empire via his financial holdingcompany Italmobiliare, active in banking, insurance and newspapers (108). Pesentiwas the most senior of a trio of Vatican financial backers, the other two being P2members Michele Sindona and Roberto Calvi (109). Pesenti had a long history as apatron of far-Right groups; in the early 1960s, Pesenti gave a regular gift of 3.5million lire to delle Chiaie's group Avanguardia Nazionale, which had begun trainingits militants in revolutionary warfare in the spring of 1964 (110). Pesenti would be amajor source of funds for the Cercle Pinay and for Damman's Academy throughoutthe early 1970s until Sindona's attempted takeover of his business empire wouldforce Pesenti to cut their funding.Whilst Pesenti provided the initial financial backing for the sniffer planes,Sanchez Bella used his contacts as adviser to the Union des Banques Suisses toarrange for UBS Director Philippe de Weck to come and witness the trials. De Weckwas the main financier later implicated in the sniffer plane scandal; he would serveas Chairman of de Villegas' sniffer plane company, Fisalma (111). The inventionwould turn out to be a massive fraud; although de Weck would succeed in retrievingsome £50 million of the funds provided by Elf, the French state oil company whichhad invested heavily in the project, another £50 million would never be recovered,spent, according to de Weck, on "religious charities and other good causes" (112).Other developments simultaneous with the genesis of the sniffer plane projectmight well explain the exact nature of some of these 'good causes'. Whilst the launchof the AESP was progressing so well, the nascent Cercle network suffered threeserious setbacks in 1969-70. The first was, as mentioned above, the decision by theBritish IRD to cut off contacts with INTERDOC and the Albertini network; the secondwas the advent in September 1969 of a "hostile" government in Germany under WillyBrandt. The third setback seemed at first sight to be promising – the election victoryin June 1969 of Georges Pompidou, which considerably strengthened the networkrun by his old schoolfriend, Georges Albertini.For Jean Violet however, Pompidou’s victory would soon turn into disaster;his fifteen year relationship with the SDECE would be abruptly severed. In October1970, Pompidou appointed a new head of the SDECE, Alexandre Comte deMarenches. De Marenches carried out a major purge within the SDECE, andtogether with many other staff, Violet found himself evicted from the cosy niche theSDECE had offered him since 1957. The SDECE under de Marenches was no longerprepared to pay the exorbitant cost of Violet's operations. In the secret intelligencereports he wrote on the Cercle Pinay in 1979-80, Hans Langemann, the topBavarian civil servant in charge of security matters, reported that General Jacquier,head of SDECE from 1962 to 1966, had been giving Violet DM 72,000 a year andthat Violet had been getting the same sum from the BND's General Gehlen.In his testimony to the French parliamentary inquiry into the sniffer planescandal, de Marenches stressed the financial burden of Violet's operations:"One figure [in agents' budgets] attracted my attention because it was followedby a lot of zeros. I asked who was this champion of intelligence. It wasintimated that 'he was top of the range, an extraordinary person, he is anagent of the Vatican' ... with considerable difficulty, after two or three days, Iobtained his reports: a normally gifted person could have compiled them byreading Le Monde, Le Figaro, and three or four other magazines and adding afew personal touches. That was his entire production. I therefore decided todispense with his services" (113).It is also possible that Violet, the éminence grise par excellence, hadaccumulated too much power for comfort, as de Marenches hinted in his 1986memoirs:"Before my arrival, the service included a picturesque personality (I won't say'charming' because I have never met him myself) who was one of these moreor less imaginary sources of intelligence for the service for many years. Hebecame well-known later on in connection with the planes whose smellingpowers were front-page news for a while. I dispensed with his services severalweeks after I had taken over. On the basis of the reports I had been shown, Inoticed that his services were very expensive. The results of the funds thathad been given him in the past were not those one was entitled to expect froma good 'honourable correspondent' [intelligence source]. For a press reviewthat anybody could have compiled, he had been paid the highest fees in theservice. I was told he ran a pay-off system within the SDECE itself. I put anend to his exploits and had him dismissed within half an hour ... some [of theSDECE staff dismissed] were quickly hired by a private parallel network thathad nothing to do with the official services of the State [Elf's PSA, see below].The sniffer plane affair is a skillful fraud whose outcome is unknown ... in themaze I had discovered in 1970, there were a certain number of parasites whowere not serving the State or France but were involved in lobbies,organizations whose foreign ramifications at times gave rise to seriousproblems" (114).One such lobby was the newly expanded Cercle Pinay network, and thanks tofunding from Pesenti, Violet was able to overcome the withdrawal of SDECE supportand extend the Academy's international outreach in those countries where Cerclecontacts were weakest, notably Britain. The natural partner for this veteran Frenchcovert operator was Brian Crozier and his Institute for the Study of Conflict, thusforging a Franco-German-British axis for the Cercle complex.1971 - 1975OUTREACH AND OPERATIONSTHE CERCLE, THE ACADEMY AND THE INSTITUTEIt was in mid-1971 that Violet contacted Crozier, following the publication inUS News and World Report of a long interview with Crozier on the subject ofterrorism and Communist intentions (115). Violet suggested that the ISC shouldorganize a study group on the problems inherent in the détente process; Violet'sgroup would put up the funds thanks to Pesenti. Violet brought along the report ofan initial study group he had chaired, which was circulated to all members of theISC and which provoked objections from one unidentified Board member for its"extreme right-wing views". Once those objections had been overcome, an ISC studygroup was set up including Crozier, Moss and two experts of interest: SovietologistRobert Conquest, and Leo Labedz, editor of the CCF magazine Survey and one of themost important sources of material throughout the FWF operation (116). The studygroup met between July and November 1971 with, as a backdrop, Edward Heath'sexpulsion of 105 Soviet diplomats and officials on charges of spying. These concernswere integrated into the ISC's deliberations; as Crozier records, "a Whitehall friend ofmine had brought me a detailed analysis of Soviet spying activities and techniqueswhich I fed into our discussions" (117). The Study Group's findings were publishedin January 1972 as an ISC Special Report entitled European Security and the SovietProblem. The Cercle Pinay were delighted with the result, as an internal ISC memodated 21st January, 1972 shows:"Report on European Security and the Soviet Problem; Visit of Maître Jean Violet.The Chairman said that from what he'd heard, the report had been a remarkablesuccess. He was impressed with the way in which M. Pinay had accepted the viewsof the ISC on how the Institute thought it should be handled, and it was gratifyingthat the Pinay Committee had been so delighted with the finished result.Mr. Crozier said that M. Violet, who had commissioned the report on behalf of thePinay Committee, had come to London with M. Pinay during that week and that he,with Mr. Goodwin, had met them over lunch. Pinay had given Mr. Crozier documentsrelating to their next project. M. Pinay had presented a copy of European Securityand the Soviet Problem to President Nixon and Dr. Kissinger in America. Earlier thatweek he had had a three hour session with President Pompidou, during which timehe had presented him with a copy of the publication in French. Maître Violet hadalso presented copies to a number of German politicians, mainly ChristianDemocrats, who are having the report translated into German. And he had shown acopy to the Spanish Minister [probably Sanchez Bella, Minister for Information] andto the Pope. NSIC in New York had bought 500 of the ISC's initial print order[providing the ISC with an immediate income of £2,000], and another 500 had beenbought by the American Bar Association. In effect, we were out of print on the day ofpublication. Numerous orders were in hand for the reprint. A leader in the DailyTelegraph of 14 January spoke highly of the publication" (118).To give wide promotion to the Cercle/ISC study, Violet used the AESPnetwork; in a letter dated 28th January, 1972, Violet asked Damman to send outfour pages from the ISC report to all addresses on the Academy's mailing list. On11th February, Violet told Damman to make use of the Institute's services and tokeep in touch with Crozier. An AESP\MAUE activity report for the first quarter of1973 gives a picture of the intensity of Damman's operation; a note indicates thatthe total number of mailings sent out by the Academy in 1973 would exceed 50,000.As the ISC Council minutes record, the Cercle Pinay was delighted with theresults of their collaboration with the ISC, and the Cercle and its backer Pesentiwere to become a major source of funding for the ISC. ISC Council minutes of 11thJuly 1972 report that "Mr Crozier said that he had recently spoken about the futureof the ISC with members of the Pinay Committee in Paris. He was hopeful of thiscommittee putting up some £20,000 in 1973." This grant represented a major part ofthe ISC's annual budget of some £30,000 and replaced the CIA funding channelledvia Kern House Enterprises:"The Kern House subsidy continued until at least the middle of 1972, bywhich time other sources of finance had materialized. Together with 2,000odd subscriptions to ISC publications, they make up ISC's budget of, as of1976, over £30,000" (119).The significance of the Cercle Pinay grant can be judged by comparison toother gifts to the ISC by multinational companies: the Ford Foundation donated£20,000 over three years, and, in 1971, Shell had contributed a lump sum of£30,000 (120).The success of the collaboration between the Cercle and the ISC led to asecond joint venture in 1972-73, the production of another ISC Special Report to"analyse the crisis in Western societies in the light of Soviet subversion" (121). InSeptember 1972, a study group was convened including Irish expert Iain Hamilton,former managing editor of FWF and Director of Studies of the ISC. "This time theWhitehall input was even more substantial than with the previous study group. Itincluded comprehensive details of the Soviet KGB and GRU presence throughoutWestern Europe. The only country missing was Britain itself, partly no doubt forreasons of national security, but mainly because of the still recent expulsion of the105 Soviet spies. Without revealing the name of my informant, or his department, Imade it clear to the participants that the material provided came from an officialsource. ... Our report, The Peacetime Strategy of the Soviet Union, was published inMarch 1973. It provided individual country studies of Soviet subversion covering theUnited Kingdom, France, West Germany, Italy and the United States, with shorterentries for smaller countries. It was probably the most comprehensive compilation offacts and analysis to have been presented in public. ... the former Prime MinisterAntoine Pinay, then over eighty but still wonderfully energetic, was so fired withenthusiasm on reading the report that he came to London to present it in person toPrime Minister Edward Heath" (122).Jean Violet recognized that the ISC and their publications were the mostappropriate source for a Western propaganda counter-offensive against Sovietsubversion, but the ISC's Conflict Studies were only published in English. From1973 onwards, one of the major concerns for the Cercle Pinay complex was thereforeto ensure European distribution, and particularly French-language publication, ofthe ISC's output. The Cercle's existing French-language outlets were not adapted torunning an international campaign of this scope; the AESP's monthly bulletin,Europe Information, was an amateurish production with a print run of only 2,000copies. Violet felt that the Academy's bulletin was not prestigious enough to be thevehicle of Cercle\ISC material, and so in 1973 an existing journal, the Bulletin deParis, was taken over, and a second, Le Monde Moderne, was founded with fundingfrom Pesenti (123). Over the next few years, these two publications were to be majorFrench-language outlets for ISC reports.The Bulletin de Paris, close to the conservative white-collar union CGC, wouldconcentrate in 1974-75 on similar themes to the ISC: the chaotic situation inPortugal, communist designs on Southern Africa and threats to the Cape route forthe West’s supply of commodities, the deception of détente and the war ofsubversion waged by the Soviet Union. Amongst its correspondents were Franz JosefStrauss and General Jean Callet, a veteran of Indochina in 1950 and Algeria in1956 who directed the Institut des Hautes Etudes de Défense Nationale from 1972 to1974.Le Monde Moderne, a quarterly foreign affairs magazine, reached a moreprestige audience and was edited by a close associate of Violet's, Jean Vigneau,together with former SDECE officer Jacques Leguèbe, and Bernard Lejeune, editorof the Courrier austral. Le Monde Moderne was a regular French-language vehicle forthe ISC's publications - the first issue in 1973 consisted mainly of a translation ofthe 1972 ISC Special Report commissioned by the Cercle Pinay, European Securityand the Soviet Problem. In an issue later that year, Le Monde Moderne published theISC's Cercle-sponsored Special Report from March 1973, The Peacetime Strategy ofthe Soviet Union, followed in 1975 by the ISC’s March 1974 Conflict Study Marxismand the Church of Rome. Other contributors to Le Monde Moderne included Strauss,Sanchez Bella, Moss and General Callet (124).THE AESP IN 1972 AND PEACE WITHOUT FRONTIERSIn January 1972, at the same time as the ISC published their first SpecialReport commissioned by the Cercle Pinay, the AESP held its XVth CharlemagneGrand Dinner in Brussels. The attendance list of the Grand Dinner, held on the 15thJanuary 1972 at the Cercle des Nations, reveals other early contacts that theAcademy enjoyed. The top members of the Academy and the PEU were inattendance: Habsburg and Coudenhove Kalergi presided over the dinner. Reduced toa figurehead in Habsburg's Academy, Coudenhove Kalergi’s death in July 1972would clear the way for Habsburg to take over full control of all three organisations,the PEU, CEDI and the AESP.At the January 1972 dinner, Habsburg and Coudenhove Kalergi wereseconded by the Brussels organizing group of Damman, Vankerkhoven, de Villegasand Jacques Jonet, a former political secretary of Otto von Habsburg's and a Vice-President of MAUE, the Belgian PEU section run by Damman. Germany wasrepresented by the Federal Secretary of PEU Germany, Karl-Friedrich Grau, thecoordinator of the Swiss ISP set up the year before, and also by Rudolf Dumont deVoitel, the EEC official who was a member of the AESP's Permanent Delegation andBoard member of PEU Germany.From Paris came the French coordinators of the AESP, Jean Violet and MarcelCollet, accompanied by René-Louis Picard, President of the International Society ofWilton Park, who regularly attended AESP events from at least 1971 onwards. Picardis an interesting contact for the AESP, as Wilton Park was a forum for propagandaactivities by the British Foreign Office. In his 1966 study of "anti-communist politicalwarfare", future Conservative MP and partner of Crozier Geoffrey Stewart-Smith listsWilton Park with the IRD:"It is generally felt that the Research Department and its sister organization,the Information Research Department ... have a staff which is woefullyinadequate in view of the growing importance of its work, and that itspersonnel are underpaid. Now if any British taxpayer's money is being spenton strategic political warfare, it is spent in the work of these twodepartments... Wilton Park at Steyning, Sussex, controlled by the InformationExecutive Department, 'is an institution sponsored by Her Majesty'sGovernment. But, while the Government finds about seven-eighths of themoney required to run it, the Warden has a free hand and is responsible forthe planning of conferences... Wilton Park conferences of which there areusually ten a year, are a British contribution to the creation in Europe of aninformed public opinion' (H. Koeppler, The Aims of Wilton Park, Central Officeof Information, 1960, pg 8)" (125).In other words, whilst the IRD and its 'private' offshoot the ISC ensured thesurfacing of black propaganda in the international media, Wilton Park offered anofficial but confidential forum for discussions with foreign dignitaries. Aninternational network of "Friends of Wilton Park" was set up from 1968 onwards withbranches in France, Belgium, Spain, Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Italy. By1978, the Cercle would succeed in dominating this Wilton Park network by creatinga European Liaison Committee whose nine founding members included four fromthe AESP: Picard as President, Violet, Sanchez Bella and Jonet (126).Two Spanish diplomats at the AESP's January 1972 Grand Dinner also hadinfluential contacts. The first was Roberto Jacobo, whose title of Counsellor at theSpanish Embassy in Brussels concealed his activities as a member of Franco'sintelligence service. Jacobo would remain in touch with Damman throughout the1970s; Damman's diaries published by his deputy Aldo Mungo reveal contactsbetween Jacobo and Damman in February 1977, by which time Jacobo had risen tobecome the Brussels head of station. The second influential Spaniard was AlbertoUllastres, Head of the Spanish Mission to the EEC, a Life Member of the AESP and,more privately, a high-ranking member of Opus Dei (127).Another of the Academy's guests at the XVth Grand Dinner was Dr Erno(Ernest) Töttösy, European President of the World Organization of Free HungarianLawyers and leader of the Hungarian section of WACL. Sentenced to twelve yearsimprisonment for "participation in a US-inspired coup plot", Töttösy escaped duringthe 1956 revolution and fled to Belgium, obtaining Belgian citizenship in 1964.Töttösy had been in contact with Damman since at least 1961; on 3rd October ofthat year, Töttösy spoke on "The Modern Inquisition in Hungary" at a conferenceorganized by the Partisans de L'Europe Nouvelle, one of several short-lived Academyprecursors founded by Damman. After the foundation of the AESP in 1969, Töttösywould be a regular attendant at Academy events; in the late 1970s and again in the1990s, Töttösy would found associations for European-Hungarian co-operation withHabsburg and other Cercle friends.The attendance list for the XVth Grand Dinner included a certain Mr. Valori,credited as Secretary-General of the Institute for International Relations in Rome.Giancarlo Elia Valori was far more than that - at the time of the Grand Dinner, hewas one of the most powerful men within P2 and right-hand man to P2 GrandMaster Licio Gelli. As an international financial adviser for important sectors ofItalian industry (128), Valori had excellent overseas connections, particularly toLatin America, connections which he used to assist Gelli. Only one year previous tothe 1972 dinner, Valori had personally introduced Gelli to the Argentinianstrongman Peron, then in exile in Spain (129). At the time of the meeting with Peronin early 1971, Gelli had just been named organizing secretary of the P2 lodge, but byJuly of the same year, his infiltration of Masonic circles and his plans for a coup hadgone far enough to provoke Grand Master Salvini into warning a meeting of theGoverning Council of the Grand Orient of Gelli's intentions.When Peron returned to Argentina temporarily in November 1972 - tenmonths after this AESP Grand Dinner - Valori and Gelli accompanied him. AfterPeron's permanent return to Argentina in June 1973 and his investiture on 12thOctober as Argentinian President, a ceremony observed by Valori, Gelli and GiulioAndreotti, Peron appointed Gelli his Honorary Consul in Florence, a post that gaveGelli Argentinian nationality and diplomatic immunity. Gelli's contact with Peron viaValori also gave the P2 Grand Master an essential powerbase in Argentina, whereGelli set up a sister lodge to P2, just as well-connected to government as was theItalian lodge; the Argentinian P2 included Admiral Emilio Massera, head of thethree-member ruling Junta of the 1970s and 1980s.Gelli's relationship with Peron was more than intimate; Andreotti was amazedto note that Peron treated Gelli with remarkable deference and respect. Having wonover Peron, Gelli then tried to cut Valori's contacts to Peron. The two became bitterrivals for economic and political influence, and Gelli finally expelled Valori from P2 in1974. Valori would go on to provide some very significant testimony about Gelli'sactivities in Argentina and Uruguay to the Italian parliamentary commissioninvestigating P2 in 1983. A likely cause for the rivalry was the extremely lucrativenature of Gelli’s Argentinian business activities. Together with Gelli's confidant andfellow P2 member Umberto Ortolani, Valori and Gelli had founded a company calledAse (Agenzia per lo sviluppo economico or Agency for Economic Development), withthe capital being divided into 50% for Gelli, 25% for Valori and 25% for Ortolani.“Gelli brokered three-way oil and arms deals among Libya, Italy and Argentinathrough the quaintly named Agency for Economic Development, which he andUmberto Ortolani owned. In 1976 Italy sold Argentina $239 million worth of arms;by 1978 the total had hit $1.27 billion” (130).This impressive list of AESP contacts would be the platform for another jointoperation between Crozier, Violet and Damman - the launching of an internationalappeal for human rights and freedom of movement and persons. "The three of us -Damman, Violet and I - drafted an appeal for 'Peace without Frontiers', in which wedefined "our" concept of a true détente. ... The appeal, dispatched to distinguishedpeople in Western Europe from the Académie in Brussels, collected many hundredsof signatures in favour of 'Peace without Frontiers'. It is no exaggeration to claim thatthis initiative led to the Western insistence on 'Basket III' in the Helsinkidiscussions. Basket III was the third of the packages of themes for discussion at theproposed European Security Conference. It dealt with human rights, freedom ofinformation, and cultural exchanges. It was the most fundamental and therefore themost important of the 'baskets' " (131).An AESP/MAUE activity report for the first quarter of 1973 gives a glimpse ofthe work carried out by the Academy on this operation:24.1.73: Contact dinner at the Cercle des Nations - Minister von Merkatz,Archduke Otto.25.1.73: Meeting of the Permanent Delegation of the AESP. XVIIth CharlemagneGrand Dinner - more than 200 attended - wide press coverage ofArchduke Otto's speech.26.1.73: Assembly of the Academy and lunch at the Cercle des Nations - overone hundred participants - wide-ranging and lively debate on Mr.Violet's speech about the Helsinki Appeal.27.1.73: Contact meeting at the Westbury - Mr. Violet, Mr. Vallet, Comte deVillegas and Mr. Damman.Contact meetings with Mr. Vandoros from Athens, Schwarzer fromBonn, Greig from London, Trainar from Limoges.5.2.73: Mailing of 2,000 copies of Europe Information.15.2.73: Start of dissemination of the 10,000 Helsinki Appeals: printing.Printing of 7,000 accompanying letters and 7,000 reply coupons. Thisoperation will continue throughout March, April, May and June, 1973.17.2.73: A MAUE delegation attended the Assembly of the Beweging voor deVerenigde Staten van Europe (Movement for the United States ofEurope) in Antwerp. Further meetings with Mr. André Voisin and Mr.Max Richard. Contact with Mr. Thomson (Labour Party), Britishmember of the Commission of the EEC, Mr. Molenaar, President of theDutch European Movement, Mr. Koppe of Europa Union Deutschland,etc.5.3.73: Damocles, the monthly journal of the Ligue Internationale de la Liberté,distributed 1,000 Helsinki Appeals.10.3.73 Distribution of 2,000 copies of Europe Information.20.3.73 Participation of Mr. Damman at the Board Meeting of the AssociationAtlantique Belge. Preparation of the General Assembly of the ATAAtlantic Treaty Association to be held in Brussels in September 1973.22/23.3.73 Meeting of the Permanent Delegation of the AESP in Hotel Tulpenfeldin Bonn. Organization of the Helsinki Appeal Action in Germany.Working meeting with Messrs von Wersebe, Dirnacker and Mertes MP.Debate in the evening with some forty VIPs including the Secretary toformer Chancellor Ehrhard.30.3.73-1.4.73: Participated in the Wilton Park meeting in Madrid. "The economicfuture of Europe and inflation". Belgian delegation: Mr. and Mrs. deLimelette, General Vivario, Mr. Damman, Mr. Jonet, Miss Verlaine,Mrs. Bauduin.Academy contact meeting: Messrs. Violet, Vallet, Jonet and Damman.Contact with Don Manuel Fraga Iribarne, former Information Minister,who is completely won over to our cause" (132).At the January 1973 Charlemagne Grand Dinner in Aachen mentioned in thereport, Damman, de Villegas and Habsburg had the honour of welcoming adistinguished guest - Giulio Andreotti, seven times Italian Prime Minister, implicatedin many of the scandals that shook Italy during his terms of office and alongstanding friend of Pesenti and Violet who had been in contact with the AESPsince at least 1972 (133).Another important guest at the January 1973 Grand Dinner - indeed, withViolet and Crozier, a future member of the ruling triumvirate of the Cercle Pinay inthe 1980s - was the German diplomat and Count Hans Graf Huyn, born in Warsawwhere his father had been the German Embassy's Press Attaché. Huyn would serveas a diplomat from 1955 to 1971; between 1963 and 1965, he would work on theimplementation of the 1963 Elysée Treaty, concluded after the secret negotiationsbetween Pinay, Adenauer and Strauss that had been facilitated by Violet.Huyn was another of the CEDI recruits to the Academy; a 1972 CEDIpublication lists Huyn as a member of the International Council of CEDI alongsideAESP members Habsburg, Sanchez Bella, von Merkatz and Vankerkhoven. At thetime of the 1973 Grand Dinner, Huyn was working as Strauss’ foreign policy adviserin the German Parliament, a post he would fill from 1971 until elected himself as aCSU MP in 1976. Huyn would go on to serve in the German Parliament until 1990,acting as the key foreign and defence policy spokesman for the CSU; his CDUcounterpart, Dr Werner Marx, had served with him on the CEDI InternationalCouncil since at least 1972. Besides representing Strauss within the Cercle Pinay,Huyn would also become a central linkman for the Cercle in Germany, serving onthe Boards of numerous propaganda outfits of the German Right, described in laterchapters (134).Damman's mention in the activity report of a meeting in January 1973 with"Mr. Greig from London" almost certainly refers to Ian Greig, at the time Chairman ofthe Subversion Committee of the Monday Club and a close associate of the ISC sinceits creation in 1970. The ISC would also assist the Academy’s outreach to other ISCfriends. A letter from Damman to Violet dated 12th September, 1973 stated that "acontact meeting was held with one of the staff of Brian Crozier, founder and directorof the Institute for the Study of Conflict" (135). During that meeting, the ISCrepresentative must have given a favourable report about the longstandingcollaboration between the ISC and INTERDOC, for the AESP decided to contactINTERDOC to discuss future cooperation, starting a relationship between the twogroups that would be formalized in 1978 by the Director of INTERDOC becoming anAESP member (136).THE AESP, CEPIC AND THE 1973 COUPIn 1972, whilst Violet and Damman were cooperating closely with Crozier’sISC and Grau's German and Swiss groups, several leading AESP\MAUE membersset up a right-wing ginger group within the major Belgian conservative party, theParti Social Chrétien (PSC). The group, CEPIC, the Centre Politique desIndépendants et des Cadres Chrétiens, would later become an official section of thePSC. In September 1973, a Gendarmerie report by Major de Cock implicated severalprominent AESP\CEPIC members in funding an extreme right-wing group, the NEMClubs. A 1976 Gendarmerie report by Chief Adjutant Roger Tratsaert further allegedthat the NEM Clubs had been major participants in plans for a coup d'état byelements of the Gendarmerie in the early 1970s (137).The most prominent founding member of CEPIC to belong to Damman'sAcademy was former Prime Minister Paul Vanden Boeynants, commonly known asVdB. An AESP Member of Honour since at least June 1970, he would rise to becomePresident of CEPIC from 1977 onwards and leader of the PSC. VdB was implicatedby the de Cock report in funding groups planning a coup d'état; at the time, he wasBelgian Defence Minister, the minister responsible for overseeing the Gendarmerie.Another figure common to CEPIC and the AESP was Baron Bernard deMarcken de Merken. A member of the PEU Central Council with Habsburg, Pons,Damman and Biggs-Davison, and also a Board Member of MAUE, de Marcken hadbeen a member of the AESP core group, the Permanent Delegation, since theAcademy's inception in 1969. As we have seen, de Marcken had been present at the1969 meeting with Violet, Damman and de Villegas which launched the sniffer planescheme. De Marcken was also named in the de Cock report.A third central figure in CEPIC named in the de Cock report was the CEPICtreasurer, Baron Benoît de Bonvoisin, Vanden Boeynant's political adviser whilstVdB was Defence Minister (138). De Bonvoisin is one of the most notoriouscharacters in European fascism with particularly close links to the Italian MSI andStefano delle Chiaie; in 1975, de Bonvoisin would host a gathering of Europeanfascists at his castle at Maizeret, attended by the heads of Ordine Nuovo, the MSI,the National Front, Fuerza Nueva and the French Forces Nouvelles, amongst others.The Belgian representatives at the 1975 fascist summit were AESP contact EmileLecerf, editor of the NEM, and Francis Dossogne of the Front de la Jeunesse, the twoorganizations that the CEPIC members were accused of financing in the de Cockreport.De Bonvoisin's close relationship with AESP leaders would not be confirmedby formal membership of the Academy until the late 1970s, but as VdB's factotum,he would be a regular participant at AESP administration meetings. He was also anintimate of Archduke Otto von Habsburg, and was in close contact with Jean Violet,as indicated by a diagram of connections between various persons drawn up byleading Belgian fascist Paul Latinus, in which Violet's name figures directly under deBonvoisin's. Significantly Violet is not linked by Latinus to any other person on thelist – possibly a gateway into a different network. Aldo Mungo, Damman's formerdeputy as AESP Delegate-General and MAUE Secretary-General, offers aninteresting and no doubt well-informed claim in his pseudonymous exposé Enquêteset Reportages:"What links are there between this man [de Bonvoisin] and lawyer Violet?Apparently none, except for the declarations made by de Bonvoisin who,amongst friends, claimed to have the warmest relations with the mysteriouslawyer ... Before the sniffer plane affair got juicy, de Bonvoisin and Dammanwere on good terms ... once Violet's funds began flowing to Damman, relationsbetween the two took a turn for the worse, each clearly seeking to be the solebeneficiary of such manna. If we are now certain that Damman and hisfriends benefited royally from Violet's 'subsidies', it is more difficult to provethe same for de Bonvoisin. One point is certain: the hostilities between thetwo camps ended with the end of the sniffer plane affair. It is not proof, but itdoes allow us a hypothesis: what if Violet, like the Red Brigades, had set uptwo 'columns' in Belgium, applying the old principle of not putting all one'seggs in the same basket?" (139).Beyond his contacts with Violet, de Bonvoisin also enjoyed a privilegedrelationship with Antoine Pinay; de Bonvoisin's father Pierre had been one of thefounding members of the Bilderberg Group with Pinay in 1952. When de Bonvoisinwas attacked in the Press in a 1981 revival of the charges of funding the Front de laJeunesse and NEM, the NEM Club magazine retaliated by printing a picture of deBonvoisin in Washington in the company of two Bilderberg members: DavidRockefeller and Antoine Pinay (140).The NEM Clubs themselves were formed of readers of the fascist magazine,Nouvel Europe Magazine, edited by Emile Lecerf. The history of the Nouvel EuropeMagazine is interesting: it was founded on 14th December 1944 as Grande-Bretagneby British intelligence agent Cecil H. de Sausmarez. De Sausmarez had been PressAttaché at the British Embassy in Brussels in 1939; evacuated to Britain in 1940, hetook over control of the Belgian and Dutch resistance networks run by the PoliticalWarfare Executive, and as such forged links with a branch of the Flemish NewOrder, the Verdinaso movement. De Sausmarez also coordinated psychologicalwarfare in the form of radio broadcasts to the two countries. In 1945, he returned tothe British Embassy in Brussels where he worked until 1948. The editor of themagazine de Sausmarez founded was a personal friend, the Verdinaso militant PierreBlanc; the editorial writer of the journal, working under the pseudonym OssianMathieu, was Emile Lecerf, the magazine's future editor and protégé of de Bonvoisin.The magazine would soon be retitled Europe-Amerique before becoming Europe-Magazine and then Nouvel Europe Magazine (141). The magazine had a long historyof being involved in underground paramilitary groups; one of Europe-Amerique'scorrespondents was André Moyen, a key figure in the Belgian Gladio network (142).Europe-Amerique was also the launching ground for a young Belgian journalist andclose friend of de Bonvoisin's who would later become a leading Americandisinformation asset, Arnaud de Borchgrave.Emile Lecerf was a longstanding acquaintance within AESP circles: he ranthe Belgian WACL section LIL with AESP\MAUE member Paul Vankerkhoven in theearly 1970s. As we've seen, Lecerf was a guest at the January 1969 CharlemagneGrand Dinner organized by Damman, where he shared a table with Guérin-Sérac ofAginter Press, just four months before the Milan bomb that launched the strategy oftension in Italy. This contact between Lecerf and Aginter Press, masters ofdestabilization, would soon bear fruit: in April 1971, one month after Lecerf becameeditor-in-chief of NEM and two years to the dot after AN's Milan bomb, the magazinemade the first of several references to a coup d'état in a long article entitled Thetechnique of an ideal coup d'état (143). Such incitation to revolt evidently did notalienate Lecerf's backers: the next month, the NEM moved to new premises, ownedby de Bonvoisin.The same allegations of funding for the NEM Clubs and the Front de laJeunesse provided by VdB and de Bonvoisin would again surface in connection withcoup plots in the 1980s, covered in a later chapter. Despite the contact betweenGuérin-Sérac and Lecerf in 1969 and the links between Lecerf and the AESP\MAUEfrom the early seventies through to the eighties, the official enquiries intodestabilization in Belgium have paid scant attention to Aginter Press, the AESP andtheir contacts with Emile Lecerf.CONSULTANTS IN COUNTER-INSURGENCYIn 1972-73, whilst producing the two Special Reports commissioned by theCercle Pinay and working on the Academy's Helsinki Appeal, the ISC was also activeon the British domestic scene. Although it was an 'unattributable' asset, the ISCdeveloped unprecedented links with the State by lecturing on subversion not only toindustry but also to the British Army (including the SAS) and at the National PoliceCollege.In 1972, John Alderson, Commandant of the Bramshill Police College wrote toPeter Janke of the ISC requesting their assistance in developing a course onterrorism and counter-subversion. As Janke wrote in a report of his visit toBramshill in July 1972, "the Commandant assured me that he would like to keep intouch more frequently with the Institute and would bear very much in mind ourcapacity to be of service to Bramshill" (144).Following this collaboration between the ISC and Bramshill, "as a sign ofrenewed mutual confidence", IRD commissioned the ISC to produce a Manual ofCounter-Insurgency, consisting of a series of seven separate Counter-InsurgencyStudies. "This enabled IRD to distribute the studies selectively, according to thecharacter of the government at the receiving end", Crozier notes (145); despite thestamp "for official use only", the Foreign Office might indeed not have wanted todistribute studies such as Psychological and Information Measures and TheRehabilitation of Detainees too widely.The Manual of Counter-Insurgency might have "contributed significantly to theinternational reputation of the ISC" but it was also stepping on someone else'sbureaucratic turf, as Crozier noted: "IRD had always had its enemies within theForeign Office, however. With some logic, many high officials objected to itsinvolvement in domestic affairs ... Logically, a counter-subversion organisationshould have been run by the Home Office" (146). This concern within the ForeignOffice led in 1973 to what Crozier calls "the IRD massacre", when IRD's budget wasremoved from the secret vote, unattributable briefings were ended and a quarter ofIRD's four hundred staff were transferred elsewhere in the Foreign Office. Althoughdepriving the ISC of a powerful patron, the reduction in IRD activities made the ISCeven more important as a propaganda outlet.The ISC's rôle as consultants in counter-insurgency would also lead it tostudy the war in Northern Ireland. The ISC Council minutes from January 1972mention an ISC conference on Ireland that was held at Ditchley Park underconditions of extreme secrecy. Ditchley Park is a conference centre at Enstone inOxfordshire used for private VIP meetings which are guarded by Special Branch andMI5. Ditchley Park was closely linked to the Bilderberg Group, fourteen of whosemembers sat on the centre's Board of Governors at one time or another (147). One ofthe results of the ISC’s Ditchley Park conference on Ireland would seem to be thecreation in November 1972 of the British-Irish Association, founded by IainHamilton, Managing Director of Forum World Features and later Editorial Director ofthe ISC. Professor, the Lord Vaizey, a Governor of the Ditchley Foundation from1973 on, would serve as Honorary Treasurer of the BIA; other BIA foundingmembers included Moss and Crozier, the latter asking specifically for his name notto be included in the list of BIA sponsors. The BIA organized its first conference inCambridge in March 1973 and a second in July 1974.Another major domestic campaign run by the ISC in 1972-73 - without thesupport of the secret services, Crozier claims - was to support counter-subversionoperations run by industry, a campaign which in February 1974 would give the ISCthe greatest media coup it ever had. In January 1972, the Deputy Director-Generalof the Confederation of British Industry John Whitehorn - "one of our converts" asCrozier puts it - had sent out a long memorandum to all CBI subscribers in which heexpressed "the concern of industry at the rise of subversive influences in Britishindustry" and appealed for contributions to five "anti-subversive organizations" (148).Four of these groups were already well-known for their reports on industrialsubversion and the blacklists of militant trades unionists that they supplied toemployers: the Economic League, Aims for Industry, Common Cause and IRIS. Thefifth anti-subversive organization destined for industry's contributions was the ISC.As we have seen, Crozier had already been working since at least 1969 with both theEconomic League and Aims for Industry within the Consultative Council ofINTERDOC.As Crozier records, "by the spring of 1972, I had decided that a special studyon subversion in industry had become necessary; the stark fact was that the tradesunions virtually owned the Labour Party" (149). As industry was being slow tosupport the ISC's campaign, Crozier asked Nigel Lawson, whom Crozier had knownat the Spectator, to produce a brief report entitled Subversion in British Industry. InNovember 1972, thirty copies of the Lawson report were printed and distributed tothe captains of industry, thanks to the help of John Dettmer, Chairman of theEconomic League, and Michael Ivens, Director of Aims for Industry. The Lawsonreport succeeded in raising the funds to convene a study group on subversion inindustry which began working in the autumn of 1973. The backdrop at the time wasthe confrontation between the National Union of Mineworkers and the Heathgovernment over Heath's Industrial Relations Act, culminating in Heath calling anelection for February 1974 under the slogan "Who governs Britain?" As Crozierrecords: "Just before polling day, the Institute's report, Sources of Conflict in BritishIndustry, had been published with unprecedented publicity" (150). This media coupwould be a major contribution by the ISC to a concerted campaign against theLabour candidate Harold Wilson, a campaign described further below.Besides its British and European operations in 1972-73, the ISC was also anactive partner in the CIA's media campaign against Allende when its material wouldalso be surfaced by a Chilean CIA front group, the Institute for General Studies. Themost prolific author in this campaign was Crozier's partner Robert Moss, a centralmember of the ISC who had visited Chile in early 1972 as a correspondent for theEconomist. In February and March of 1973, the ISC published two Conflict Studieson Chile written by Moss, The Santiago Model: Revolution within Democracy and TheSantiago Model: the Polarisation of Politics. The ISC would also focus on alleged KGBsupport for Allende in the Caribbean region at this time, producing a Conflict Studyby Crozier entitled Soviet Pressures in the Caribbean in June 1973 and a SpecialReport by Moss, The Stability of the Caribbean, in November 1973, the latter beingrepublished in book form by the Georgetown Centre for Strategic and InternationalStudies (CSIS) (151). Forum World Features itself would publish the most notoriouscontribution to the anti-Allende campaign, Robert Moss’ Chile's Marxist Experiment.The book would arrive too late to contribute to the campaign - Allende had alreadybeen killed in the military coup - but the book still had its uses: the Chilean Juntabought nearly 10,000 copies for distribution by the Chilean Embassy in Washington.Moss would add his conclusions on the coup in March 1974 in an article entitledChile's Coup and After published by Encounter, the journal of the FWF parent body,the CCF. Moss would also come back to Allende and the coup in his 1975 book TheCollapse of Democracy (152).THE WAR AGAINST COMMUNIST SUBVERSIONBy the mid-1970s, the Cercle complex had succeeded in creating aninternational contact network of groups working on anti-Soviet and countersubversionpropaganda. In Belgium, the Cercle worked hand in hand with the AESPand could count on the help of the Defence Minister and his aides. In France, theprestige of a former Prime Minister and intelligence contacts from SDECE daysensured the Cercle's influence. In Britain, the complex found parliamentary friendsin the Monday Club and amongst the discreet gentlemen from the world of blackpropaganda, public and private. In the Netherlands, they could turn to the archivistsof INTERDOC, well connected to the BVD. In Germany, former BND agents,clandestine fundraisers and Bavarian conservative MPs consolidated the power ofthe "Lion of Bavaria", and in Switzerland an untouchable disinformation outlet couldspread the complex's message.But despite such wide-ranging contacts, the various components of theCercle's network, brought together to defend the conservative cause, felt their visionof the world to be threatened as never before. Between 1974 and 1976, a paranoidfeeling of apocalypse, of imminent Armageddon spread through the private clubs, thelobby rooms and the secret services throughout Europe: the Left was coming! InBritain, humiliated by the National Union of Mineworkers, the Conservativegovernment fell and Labour won the two elections of 1974. In France and inBelgium, the Left seemed well-placed to break the electoral monopoly of theconservatives. In the Iberian peninsula, the longstanding geopolitical stability wassoon overturned: in Portugal, the dictatorship of Salazar crumbled before the leftwingsoldiers of the Armed Forces Movement, and in Spain, the Caudillo died anddemocratic elections were called. Everywhere, the trades unions, the socialist partiesand the peace movements, nests of Soviet subversion, gained ground. The Rightwere convinced that they were witnessing the total collapse of Western society asthey knew it; this was the second emotional peak of the Cold War, a renaissance ofthe atmosphere of the 1950s. But they would not take defeat lying down, and theCercle and their friends organized to confront this wave of subversion. In his noteno. 167, written at the beginning of April 1975, Florimond Damman sets the tone ofthe age:"The Soviet Union gains no advantage in provoking a war, because under thecloak of détente, it continues to wage a war of subversion, and is winningeverywhere. The West puts up no opposition to this war of subversion, andencourages it through its weakness due to both splits in the domestic policyfield and clashes on foreign policy between European countries and alsowithin the Atlantic Alliance.I propose a meeting of an urgent brain-trust which should establish:1. the effects of the war of subversion in each of the countries of the AtlanticAlliance, in Europe as well as in the United States;2. the effects of the war of subversion throughout the world: Korea, Vietnam,Middle East, Portugal, trade routes of raw materials;3. the means that the Western block can use to initiate its own effectivesubversive action both within the Warsaw Pact countries and in the othercontaminated countries around the world;4. how to encourage countries within the Atlantic Alliance to take immediatesteps to define effective tactics for an ideological offensive, which is the onlyway to win this war of subversion. The free movement of persons and ideas isone offensive tactic; we must find others.5. consider setting up an action centre for offensive tactics in the US orCanada. Free movement of persons and ideas" (153).In response to this challenge, the Cercle Pinay would intensify its actions andcreate new outlets. In Britain, between 1974 and 1976, the ISC and its allies wouldunleash a propaganda offensive against the Labour government and its unionsupporters. With the help of the counter-subversion lobby, Edward Heath would bereplaced as leader of the Conservative Party by the hard-right candidate MargaretThatcher; by sustaining their media war, the complex helped to ensure that shebecame Prime Minister in 1979.In France in 1974, the friends of the Cercle Pinay would assist a massivesmear campaign against the Socialist candidate for the Presidency, FrançoisMitterrand. In Germany and in Switzerland, the two groups run by Karl-FriedrichGrau would organize an intensive programme of conferences and seminars on Sovietsubversion attended by Swiss and German government, police and intelligenceofficials. In Belgium, members of the AESP would set up a semi-public semi-privatecounter-subversion unit under the aegis of the military intelligence service, a unitwhich had close links to the putschist extreme Right.On the Iberian peninsula, the complex would do what it could to limit thedamage caused by the fall of the two dictatorships. In Portugal, it supported theputschist aspirations of General Spinola and his underground army, the ELP, who in1975 waged a strategy of tension with the expert help of the unmasked Aginter Pressgroup. In Spain, the complex would channel clandestine funds to its friends amongstFranco's former ministers who were standing as candidates in the first democraticelections in 1976.Internationally, with funding from the South African intelligence serviceBOSS, the Cercle complex would establish a pro-apartheid propaganda bureau inParis, and then a second in London. The complex would also extend their operationsto the US by setting up the Washington Institute for the Study of Conflict as atransatlantic relay for the complex's concerns.Finally the 'Peace without Frontiers' Helsinki Appeal launched by Crozier,Violet and Damman would bear fruit in July 1975 when the Helsinki Final Accordwas signed within the framework of the Conference on Security and Cooperation inEurope (CSCE).A VERY BRITISH COUPThe complex's UK connections lead us into the heart of a major manipulationof British domestic politics, concentrating in the period from Wilson's two electionvictories in 1974 to Margaret Thatcher's selection as Conservative Leader inFebruary 1975 and culminating with her election as Prime Minister in May 1979(154). A substantial body of information confirms the existence of a conspiracy toundermine the Labour Government of Harold Wilson, to discredit Liberal leaderJeremy Thorpe and to have Conservative leader Edward Heath replaced. ColinWallace - a former psy-ops officer within the IRD-founded Information Policy Unitin Northern Ireland and a key witness on MI5 intervention in domestic Britishpolitics in the 1970s - writes:"Various key members of the Intelligence community - past and present -assisted by influential figures in the public service, politics and commerce produceda series of political and psychological warfare projects which were designed to:a) prevent the election and re-election of a Labour Government;b) prevent any coalition between the Labour and Liberal parties;c) discredit key figures in both parties;d) collate and disseminate 'black' information which could be used to discreditor 'control' various politicians who were deemed to hold power behind thescenes in all three major political parties;e) have Mr Edward Heath removed as leader of the Conservative party andreplaced by someone of a more resolute approach to the political andindustrial unrest" (155).It is possible to divide the conspirators roughly into two groups, the first ofwhich centred on Peter Wright and a group of other serving MI5 officers who hadtransferred from MI5's K Branch (counter-espionage) to F Branch (countersubversion)when MI5 strengthened its rôle as a political police in the early 1970s.The second group was a private-sector coalition of retired MI6 officers, IRDdisinformation assets and prominent members of the Tory Right, several of whomwho would later serve as Ministers under Thatcher. Whilst the Fleet Street Pressconcentrated on Peter Wright and the MI5 faction in their reports of the Wilsondestabilization, the ex-MI6/IRD/Tory MP coalition and their partners in theindustry-funded anti-union outfits were major actors in the psychological warfarecampaign being waged, a contribution that has generally been underestimated. It isthis coalition - the "counter-subversion lobby" - that was closely connected with theCercle Pinay complex, not only through the ISC but also through two future groups,NAFF and FARI.Following his resounding defeat by the miners after power cuts, massivestrikes and the introduction of a three day working week, Conservative PrimeMinister Edward Heath called a General Election on the issue of "Who governsBritain?" The campaigning for the February 1974 election was held with thebackdrop of widespread MI5 smear campaigns about a "Communist cell in theLabour Party"; Wilson himself was placed under blanket surveillance by MI5 duringthe election campaign. For the first time, troops and tanks were deployed atHeathrow airport, and joint Army/police patrols started.On 18th January, the Times reported that the CIA and NSA were alsostepping up counter-subversion operations in Britain; in the article, former seniorCIA officer Miles Copeland declared that MI5 had their hands tied and were too timidto expose subversion. The following week, on the 25th, the Times published largelyunfounded allegations by Josef Frolik, a Czech intelligence defector to the CIA, whoclaimed that several Labour MPs were spying for the Soviet Union. Frolik was a keywitness for the counter-subversion lobby and the ultras within MI5, "confirming"their fears that the Labour Party was indeed a nest of Soviet spies; it is perhaps notcoincidental that the MI5 officers in contact with Frolik were Peter Wright, "head" ofthe ultra faction, and Charles Elwell, later Head of Counter-Subversion and anotorious right-winger who we will meet again in the 1980s as a partner of BrianCrozier's in anti-Labour smear operations. On the 28th January, the Daily Telegraphcarried a full-page article entitled Communists Aim to Dictate Labour Policy whichdescribed "the grip of Communist trades unionists on the Labour government". Theanti-union outfits' contribution to cranking up the tension was considerable: Aimsfor Industry, run by SIF's Michael Ivens, launched an appeal for £500,000 to preventthe election of a Labour government. The considerable sums raised from Aims's4,000 member companies (156) paid for a massive media scare campaign which rannewspaper adverts depicting Stalin hiding behind a grinning mask.Another important contributor to the media barrage was the veteran MI6coupmaster, G. K. Young. Having stood unsuccessfully as Conservative candidate forBrent East in 1972, Young brought the ideological struggle in the Monday Club to ahead in 1973 when he stood for Chairman. Young lost by 455 votes to 625, and leftthe Monday Club. He then developed another tack, working with Ross McWhirterand two former MI6 officers, Anthony Cavendish and Colonel Ronald Wareing, to setup the Unison Committee for Action, a citizens' militia to keep essential servicesrunning, perhaps the most significant of the three private armies formed in the mid-1970s. Unlike the militias formed in Belgium in the early 1970s and early 1980s, theprivate armies in Britain would seem to have been not primarily a military but apsychological operation. Unison may have only been intended to be a "paper tiger",whose aim of strengthening the public feeling of a climate of disorganization andimpending chaos was achieved simply by the news of its creation. That news cameon 1st February 1974, when Young first announced to MI5 friend Chapman Pincherthe formation of Unison.Two days later, the ISC followed with a major media coup when over a page ofthe Observer was given over to a summary of the ISC's Special Report Sources ofConflict in British Industry under the banner headline The Communist Connection.Using information from the ISC's right-wing anti-union partners Aims for Industry,the Economic League, IRIS and Common Cause, the report claimed that the unionswere rampant with "red wreckers" plotting to bring British industry to its knees. Onthe 20th February, eight days before the election, the London Evening News carried aclaim by G. K. Young that there were "40 or 50 Labour MPs for whom the Labourticket is a cover for more sinister activities". Another element in the anti-unioncampaign was death threats against union leaders; the police took the threatsseriously enough to arrange for police protection for several TUC officials (157).Despite this barrage of propaganda, the election on the 28th February 1974did not give any party a clear majority. After the Liberals refused a coalition with theConservatives, Edward Heath was forced to resign. The counter-subversion lobby'sfears had become reality; having won the largest number of seats, Labour formed thenew government. However, the new Prime Minister Harold Wilson had anunworkably small majority, and so he called fresh elections for October. In betweenthe two elections, the MI5 and counter-subversion lobby conspirators went all out toensure a Labour defeat.One major focus for their campaign was Northern Ireland. Whilst MI5 tacitlyencouraged the Ulster Workers' Strike of May 1974 in which the Loyalists rejectedand eventually brought down Labour's policy of power-sharing, the Army stood byand did nothing to break the Loyalists' grip. At the same time, at the IRD'sInformation Policy Unit in the Army Press Office in Northern Ireland, Colin Wallacereceived floods of MI5 smears on several dozen Westminster MPs from the Centre-Left of the Tory Party, the Liberal Party and the Labour Party, including the PrimeMinister and most of the Ministers in the Cabinet. Using the MI5 files, Wallace wastasked to create disinformation documents as a part of a comprehensive smearoperation called Clockwork Orange 2 (158).In June 1974, the three major private armies - Young's Unison, Sir WalterWalker's Civil Assistance (which appears to have grown out of Unison) and DavidStirling's GB75 were exposed in the Press – as was probably their original intention.In June, July and September, troops and tanks again made their appearance atHeathrow Airport whilst the Army continued joint patrols with the police. In August,Geoffrey Stewart-Smith joined in the anti-Left campaign by publishing a brochurecalled The Hidden Face of the Labour Party, which claimed that "over 10% of alltrades union officials in the major industrial unions are Communists or far left-wingrevolutionary Marxists". However, again, the smear campaigns and "reds under thebeds" scare tactics were not quite enough to ensure a Conservative victory; in theOctober election, Labour scraped through with a majority of three seats.Despite Labour's election victory, the propaganda barrage went on; theallegations made by the Czech defector Frolik were revived through the intermediaryof Czech exile Joseph Josten, the Director of the Free Czech Information NewsAgency, close to MI6. Josten had served with SHAEF Psychological Warfare duringWorld War II and immediately after the war had won the Czech Defence Ministry'sprize for his study Propaganda and Peace during the War before leavingCzechoslovakia in 1948. In 1974-75, Josten was in close contact with the countersubversionlobby; he would join the ISC, SIF and Monday Clubs members in NAFFthe following year, and would later write an ISC Conflict Study. Through Josten,Frolik accused Labour Minister John Stonehouse of being a Czech agent; Wilsonangrily denied this in Parliament on 17th December 1974. On 19th December,Stewart-Smith wrote to Josten offering him and Frolik money to prove that Wilsonwas lying (159).The 11th February 1975 brought the highpoint of a long campaign whenEdward Heath was finally deposed as Leader of the Conservative Party and replacedby a relatively unknown outsider, his former Education Secretary, MargaretThatcher. Thatcher's leadership campaign, which culminated in her victory over herrival William Whitelaw by 146 votes to 79, had been run by her private secretary,Tory MP and former MI6 officer Airey Neave, who has been accused of playing acentral rôle in the Thatcher conspiracy together with Peter Wright, G.K. Young andthe Crozier complex. During the war Neave had served in MI9, the escape network ofMI6, after having been imprisoned in Colditz Castle along with two other key figuresin the counter-subversion lobby: David Stirling, founder of the SAS and creator ofthe private army GB75, and Charles Elwell of MI5 who, with Peter Wright, wouldhandle Frolik.After the war, Neave studied law with Margaret Thatcher before becoming aConservative MP in 1953. With the reputation of a war hero and with his MI6contacts, Neave rose quickly in politics and in 1974 threw his influence on the Torybackbenches behind Thatcher as candidate for the Conservative leadership. Afterher victory, Thatcher showed her recognition for the crucial part he had played inher leadership campaign by appointing him to the key position of Shadow Ministerfor Northern Ireland; his deputy as Shadow Minister was John Biggs-Davison. Oncein power, Thatcher also planned to nominate him to head a new governmentdepartment to oversee the security and intelligence services. Neave would never takethe post; he would be killed by an Irish National Liberation Army bomb blast in theHouse of Commons car park on 30th March 1979, five weeks before Thatcher waselected Prime Minister.With a new hard right leader at the helm of the Conservative Party, thecounter-subversion lobby's campaign continued. On 26th February, two weeks afterThatcher's election as Conservative leader, a House of Lords debate on "Subversiveand Extremist Elements" which again aired the Frolik allegations was initiated byLord Chalfont (Alun Gwynne-Jones), a former military intelligence officer and Timesdefence correspondent. A Labour Party member ennobled by Harold Wilson in 1964and appointed Minister for Disarmament, Chalfont would leave the Labour Party tenyears later and rapidly veer rightwards to become a significant player in the anti-Wilson counter-subversion lobby. Allegedly "the CIA's man in the House of Lords",Chalfont certainly had been a member of the Executive Committee of the CIA-fundedEuropean Movement.MITTERRAND MENACEIn France, 1974 saw the first challenge by Mitterrand to unbroken Republicanrule in France since 1945. The Cercle Pinay's sympathies were clearly with Giscardd'Estaing, who had received his first ministerial post from Antoine Pinay; severalMembers of Parliament from Giscard's party were members of the AESP. Propagandaoperations against the Left intensified after June 1972, when Mitterrand's SocialistParty concluded an electoral alliance with the Communist Party on the basis of aCommon Programme. In the run-up to the Parliamentary elections in March 1973,the CNPF – the French employers’ confederation that was Violet's stamping ground -and the Union des Industries Métallurgiques et Minières (UIMM) ran extensivepropaganda campaigns highlighting the national disaster that would result from theelection of France's first post-war Socialist government. In the six months fromOctober 1972 to March 1973, the UIMM alone published nearly 9 million anti-Mitterrand brochures:Revelations, an eight page newspaper: 3.5 million copiesMonsieur Dupont sees red, 16 page photo-novel: 4 million copiesOpen letter to left-wing intellectuals, 8 pages: 600,000 copiesThe nightmare or the application of the Common Programme, 40 pages: 210,000 copiesFrance deserves better than Chile, 8 pages: 300,000 copiesLetter to doctors, Letter to hairdressers: 40,000 copies each (160).Crozier's close associate Georges Albertini also ran several groups whichorganized discrete coups for the CNPF, denouncing communism and syndicalism,and assisting 'independent' trade unions such as the CFT. One of Albertini's groupswas to play a major part in propaganda support for Giscard in the 1974 Presidentialelections; at the height of campaigning, Albertini's Association pour la Libertééconomique et le Progrès social (ALEPS) produced 750,000 letters to executives,170,000 brochures to teachers and 8 million copies of a fake daily newspaper calledFrance-Matin, all of which described the catastrophic results if Mitterrand were towin the elections. France-Matin, however, never quite had the impact it could have:print workers seized and destroyed many of the copies before they could bedistributed.News of Giscard's victory was welcomed by the complex, as Dammandescribed in a letter to Habsburg on 8th May, 1974:"So Giscard has got into power but with a very narrow margin, we have simplywon a little time which we must put to good use so as to organize ourmovements into active forces. The meeting of the 8th May has been anexcellent springboard for setting up the regional teams of MAUE which we arebuilding up mainly in Belgium and in France, and this strategy for action hasproved to be very fruitful.Maitre Violet will be arriving in Brussels tomorrow (Tuesday) and will stayuntil Thursday. Now that we are concentrating on the provisional fate ofFrance, we can draw up a plan for action. The key point is to ensure that themajority wins the next parliamentary elections which should normally be heldin three years time, and, once again, it will be a close-run fight. It's clear nowthat each important domestic event in each of our countries will have a majorimpact on a European scale, and we must strengthen our influence in thosecountries where we have very few structures: the Netherlands, Denmark andGreat Britain" (161).The extent of the Academy's influence becomes clear from a letter dated 7thAugust, 1974, from de Villegas, in Pretoria to test his sniffer planes, to Damman:"The meeting planned for Washington seems to me to be a major chance forthe Academy. It will be an opportunity for us to make new contacts and to begiven a budget which is a kind of consecration [for the Academy]. You chosewell and showed good judgment in naming Mr. Destremeau a permanentmember of the Academy. Your choice was a wise one, as President Giscardd'Estaing has appointed him Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs. All thispromises much for the future ...As far as the European relaunch isconcerned, here too you have a good card in your hand, particularly as it isPresident Giscard d'Estaing who will himself take the initiative for thisrelaunch" (162).The mention of a meeting in Washington in the late summer of 1974 isinteresting as, at this time, the British end of the Cercle complex was working on thecreation of a transatlantic bridgehead - the Washington Institute for the Study ofConflict (WISC). Four months later, in November 1974, the Cercle core of Violet,Vallet, Crozier and Huyn would host a future WISC Board member, Admiral John S.McCain Jnr, former Commander in Chief of Pacific Forces during the early VietnamWar, at the Paris launch of the Centre du Monde Moderne. In March 1975, the WISCwould be formally founded as the American counterpart to the London and Parisoutlets.As Damman's letter to Habsburg in May 1974 shows, the complex wasconcentrating "on the provisional fate of France". The ISC would also support thiscampaign by publishing in January-February 1975 a Conflict Study entitled SocialConflict in France, written by none other than Crozier's old SDECE friend from the1950s, Antoine Bonnemaison.Another old French friend of Crozier's would be active in this campaign:Georges Albertini. In May 1975, Albertini launched another magazine, La Lettre del'Homme Libre, together with Colonel Maurice Robert who had resigned as SDECEDeputy Director of Research in 1973. Robert had started his career in the Frenchmilitary, training counter-gangs in Vietnam in the early 1950s before joining SDECEin 1953 and directing their Africa Service from 1960 on. Albertini and Robert'smagazine concentrated on Communist subversion in France and would continuepublication until at least 1979. During this time, Robert was a Director of Elf, havingbeen previously mandated by Elf President Pierre Guillaumat (himself a formerFrench war-time intelligence agent) to set up and supervise a private intelligencenetwork for Elf, to be run by Colonel Jean Tropel, another former SDECE officer.Tropel had spent his career in the SDECE Counter-Espionage Division wherehe was responsible for security within Section 7, the SDECE's team of 'plumbers'.Dismissed after the Ben Barka affair in 1966, Tropel then joined Elf and from 1969onwards set up Elf's intelligence network, called PSA (Protection, Security,Administration) which would be very active, particularly in Africa. Its membersincluded many of the SDECE agents fired along with Violet by de Marenches in 1970as well as former officers of the French security service DST and mercenaries suchas Bob Denard (163).As we have seen in previous chapters, having developed the sniffer planesproject and ensured preliminary trials in Spain and a prospection campaign inSouth Africa, Violet and the two inventors Bonassoli and de Villegas had still notfound a commercial outlet for their discovery. Violet however hoped to get Elf toaccept the project, and his Trojan Horse for working his way into Elf was itsintelligence network. Violet knew Tropel well - they had been active together inCatholic organisations in the early 1970s - and Tropel had previously hired Violet'sservices as a lawyer for Elf in 1972. However, Violet did not approach Tropel directly,but first went to see Colonel Franck who functioned as Violet's SDECE case officerwhenever Violet's usual contact - the Head of the SDECE himself - was not available.Franck knew Tropel very well; during the war, when Franck had commanded theAndalousie resistance network around Bordeaux, Tropel had been his adjutant.Informed by Violet of this "incredible technological breakthrough", Franckwasted no time in contacting his former adjutant, now head of security at Elf. Tropelwas to remain intimately involved in the sniffer plane project after its acceptance byElf; Tropel would be responsible for security during the numerous trips taken byViolet and the team of inventors. Tropel would also take care of some of the financialarrangements: in 1976 some of the initial payments by Elf to Fisalma, de Villegas'sniffer plane company, would be channelled through Unindus, a Swiss subsidiary ofElf's run by Tropel. When the sniffer plane project expanded in 1978, the Unindusstaff would be reinforced by the addition of Paul Violet and Alain Tropel, the sons ofthe two former SDECE agents (164).WHITE RULE, BLACK PROPAGANDABesides carrying out its own domestic and international operations, theCercle complex was soon to become a partner in one of the largest covertpropaganda campaigns since the Second World War: the media war waged by theSouth African Department of Information (DoI) in the mid-1970s, later exposed bythe "Muldergate" scandal (165). The South African government's ErasmusCommission which investigated the scandal reported that between 1974 and 1977the DoI channelled at least $73 million into a five-year clandestine operation to"finance secret propaganda and influence-buying projects abroad".Under Information Minister Connie Mulder and his deputy Dr EschelRhoodie, some 160 projects were launched, several of which aimed to buy outnewspapers both in South Africa and abroad. One of the projects within South Africaconsisted of a failed bid to buy a majority shareholding in South African AssociatedNewspapers so as to control the Rand Daily Mail, the liberal opposition newspaperthat was part of the SAAN stable. Abroad, the projects included channeling $11million to US conservative publisher John McGoff to buy the Washington Star. Whenthis second attempt to buy a newspaper failed, McGoff used the money to purchasethe Californian daily, the Sacramento Union. In 1986, McGoff would be charged forhaving failed to register as a foreign agent of the South African government; thecharges were later dropped because the Justice Department had exceeded the fiveyear statute of limitations in bringing the case. A later project of the DoI's in the USwas the funding in 1978 of an Iowa Republican Senate nominee, Roger Epsen, whodefeated a key opponent of apartheid, Senator Dick Clark.The Cercle complex also benefited from funds from the DoI. Between 1974and 1976, Cercle members worked in close collaboration with the DoI and the SouthAfrican intelligence service BOSS in a propaganda campaign that aimed to highlightthe Soviet menace and Kremlin aspirations in Southern Africa. Le Monde Modernewas a major outlet for this common campaign; besides republishing the 1972 ISCSpecial Report, the first issue of Le Monde Moderne also contained an article byJacques Leguèbe calling for the defence of South Africa. The same theme dominatedthe second issue, which included a piece by Dr. Eschel Rhoodie. But the mostimportant step was taken on 6th November, 1973, when Le Monde Moderneorganized a three-day restricted "brain-trust" meeting on South Africa, attended byCrozier, Violet, Vallet, Damman and Mr. Burger, South African Ambassador toFrance. The Ambassador presented a two-page report drawn up personally by PrimeMinister Vorster, Information Minister Connie Mulder, his deputy Dr. EschelRhoodie and General Hendrik van der Bergh, head of BOSS. Then a discussion washeld as to how the ISC, the Academy and Le Monde Moderne could assist thecampaign that the South African government was conducting through such Pretoriafundedpublications as To The Point, a newspaper with which Le Monde Moderneworked (166). The meeting decided to launch several campaigns to put over SouthAfrica's point of view to influential figures in Europe. One targeted Members ofParliament:"A Franco-South African Friendship Association was set up a while ago. Nowwe have to breathe life into it. Increase its numbers and quality. We mustorganize manipulation of the Members of Parliament - but with subtlety"(167).This campaign was successful; from 1974 on, the number of French MPsvisiting South Africa increased considerably. Another campaign targetedindustrialists, a third the French and Belgian Press, particularly by inviting overSouth African journalists. The significance of the French group's campaigns wereconfirmed in a debate on Information held in the South African Parliament in April1975, when the Deputy Minister for Information told the Assembly "that anestimated 11 million French people had read favourable reports about South Africaas a result of his Department's careful planning concerning the type of guest invitedfrom France" (168). The brain-trust had also taken the decision to set up a secondgroup to promote South Africa: the group would be created in 1978 as the AmisFrançais des Communautés Africaines (AFCA, French Friends of the AfricanCommunities), chaired by Pinay and including Leguèbe (169).However, the November 1973 "brain-trust" meeting also decided that thegreatest need was to create a prestigious French equivalent of the ISC, a 'neutral'geopolitical institute that could back up the more personal influence of VIP visits forPretoria friends with 'academic' data on strategic considerations. According to the USJustice Department's charges against John McGoff, his attempt to buy theWashington Star for Pretoria aimed to ensure that "positive material relating to thestrategic and economic importance of South Africa to the US and the West would bepublished and disseminated to policy and opinion makers within the US capital".The ISC/Le Monde Moderne team would be a powerful European source or relay forsuch propaganda. A key theme was to be oil: the oil crisis of October 1973 hadfocused the attention of Conservatives on the need to protect the West's vital fallbackfor oil supplies - the Cape route. The DoI's campaign aimed to ensure that the West'sneed for a strategic outpost on the Cape overrode any objections about apartheid;the propaganda line to be used was, predictably, Soviet designs on world energyresources, as Violet described to Damman, Crozier and Ambassador Burger at theseminar:"Oil is the vital weapon of the Cold War. The Soviet Union controls its sourcesand seeks to dominate the main oil trade routes - South Africa and theAfrican territories owned by Portugal" (170).The first result of the campaign came in March 1974 when the ISC broughtout two Special Reports, both of which stressed the importance of South Africa forWestern oil supplies: The Security of the Cape Oil Route and Soviet Objectives in theMiddle East. The security of oil supply was also of interest to the South Africansthemselves: after personal contacts between Pinay and Vorster, de Villegas travelledto South Africa in the summer of 1974 to run a series of tests of the sniffer planes forSouth Africa's state oil company.By the end of 1974, the plan to establish a South African-backed propagandainstitute in collaboration with Le Monde Moderne and the ISC had been completed.With funding to the tune of one million francs provided by BOSS via Rhoodie (171),the Centre d'Etudes du Monde Moderne was launched in November. Amongst itsmembers were activists from the extreme Right and senior officers from the Frencharmed forces such as General Jean Callet (also of the Bulletin de Paris), General Pinand Rear-Admiral Peltier (172). On 6th November, 1974, a year to the day after theinitial brain-trust meeting, the Centre d'Etudes du Monde Moderne held aninaugural conference on the theme of the defence of Africa against the threat ofcommunist subversion. The French core group at the launch were Violet and Vallet,and the Monde Moderne team of Leguèbe and Lejeune.Attending for the ISC were Crozier and Peter Janke, author of ISC ConflictStudy No. 52, Southern Africa: End of Empire, which had just been published themonth before. Much of the study's information on 'terrorism' in Mozambique camefrom P.J. De Wit, a senior BOSS operative. Janke, formerly of IRD, was the ISC'sSenior Researcher and South Africa expert. In 1973, Janke had played host toMichael Morris, a South African 'journalist' working in London. Morris was soonexposed as a sergeant in the South African Security Police (173) who had 'resigned'earlier that year from their Special Branch to write a book South African Terrorism. In1974, Janke was able to renew his friendship with Morris whilst visiting Capetown tocollect information for Conflict Study No. 52 from De Wit at BOSS headquarters.Morris later became head of a BOSS propaganda front, the South African TerrorismResearch Centre, "a direct copy of the British Institute for the Study of Conflict, butnot half as good", according to BOSS's one-time London agent, Gordon Winter (174).Also attending the launch of the Centre d'Etudes du Monde Moderne wasCEDI member Count Hans Huyn, Strauss's foreign policy adviser. The new centre'slaunch in 1974 is the earliest recorded meeting of all three men who would form thetriumvirate coordinating the Cercle complex in the late 1970s: Violet, Crozier andHuyn. It is unlikely however that this was the three men's actual first meeting: Huynhad served since at least 1972 on the International Council of CEDI with Habsburg,Sanchez Bella, von Merkatz and Vankerkhoven – all AESP members. At the time ofthe 1974 launch, the AESP and the Cercle had already been working closely with theISC for some time. Huyn had also attended the January 1973 AESP CharlemagneGrand Dinner in the company of Habsburg, Damman and Giulio Andreotti.Alongside Violet, the Monde Moderne team, the ISC and Huyn, tworepresentatives of major American propaganda institutes with links to the ISC alsoattended the Centre's launch: James L. Winokur, a Board Member of the NSICwhich had already supported the first Cercle/ISC joint venture by buying 500 copiesof the Cercle-sponsored 1972 ISC Special Report, and Admiral John S. McCain Jnr,former Commander in Chief of US Pacific Forces (CINCPAC) from 1968 to 1972 andBoard Member of the American Security Council, the ASC (175). At this time,McCain was working closely with the ISC on final preparations to create aWashington ISC offshoot, founded four months later in March 1975.The launch of the Centre d'Etudes du Monde Moderne also hosted a sizablemilitary contingent. Attending for the South African Defence Force was Major-General Robbertze, Director of Strategic Studies (176). The French armed forces sentGenerals Callet and Pin, Colonel J.M. Bonnier, former Africa specialist at theGeneral Secretariat for National Defence, and General François Maurin, an observerfrom the Chief of General Staff of the Army. The Spanish armed forces wererepresented by Colonel J.M. Sancho Sofranis, aide to the former Chief of GeneralStaff of the Navy (177).The Centre d'Etudes du Monde Moderne soon started work; the followingyear, 1975, it would publish the book Africa and the Defence of the West by JeanVigneau of the Monde Moderne staff (178). In parallel to their considerable input tothe Centre d'Etudes du Monde Moderne, the ISC also helped South Africa by passingon the ISC's 1974 Special Report Sources of Conflict in British Industry, "which wouldbe useful for indicating how South African unions might be attacked as recalcitrantor strike-prone, not on account of any real grievances, but only because of left-wingmilitants and outside agitators" (179).THE WASHINGTON ISCAt the same time as the Cercle complex was intensifying pressure on left-wingcandidates in France and Britain and supporting BOSS in their internationalpropaganda campaign, the ISC had been working in 1974 on plans to set up anAmerican satellite. By early 1975, the final preparations had been made, and the USCommittee of the ISC (USCISC) was formally launched on 3rd March 1975, twoweeks after Thatcher became leader of the Conservative Party (180). The USCISCwould be the parent body for the Washington Institute for the Study of Conflictwhich was designed to be materially independent of the London ISC and thereforehad its own facilities for research and publication. The Washington ISC wouldhowever closely mirror the political agenda of its London predecessor; in itsStatement of Purpose, the WISC declared: "the United States, the pre-eminent powerin the Free World, is experiencing its own problems with subversion. The USInstitute for the Study of Conflict has thus been established to address this complexproblem which has not been fully recognized in this country" (181). Much of theWISC's funding was provided by Dick Scaife whose Scaife Foundation had been alongstanding source of support for the the NSIC and the ISC.The WISC was able to call on the same kind of high-power coalition of seniorpoliticians and intelligence veterans that the Cercle Pinay enjoyed in Europe. TheUSCISC or WISC Committee was chaired by former Under-Secretary of State GeorgeBall, one of the founding members of the Bilderberg group with Pinay, Voisin andBonvoisin; Ball had in fact been one of the rapporteurs at their inaugural meeting atthe Hotel Bilderberg in 1954. One month after the launch of the USCISC, Ball wouldattend the April 1975 Bilderberg conference, held in Cesme, Turkey, along withStrauss, Thatcher and Sir Frederic Bennett of SIF (182).Another Bilderberger and crucial political figure on the WISC Committee wasZbigniew Brzezinski, who had proposed to the 1972 Bilderberg conference inKnokke, Belgium, to create a similar forum to bring together the three economicworld powers, the US, Europe and Japan. The new body, the Trilateral Commission,was founded in late 1972; its first Director from 1973 to 1976 was Brzezinski.Brzezinski would also attend the 1975 Bilderberg conference with Ball, Strauss,Thatcher and Bennett. At the time the USCISC was founded, Brzezinski was workingfor the Research Institute on Communist Affairs and was Democrat candidateJimmy Carter's top foreign policy adviser; Brzezinski and Ball were considered to bethe main Democrat frontrunners for the post of Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs,a measure of the WISC's political influence.The WISC Committee also included former senior CIA officers, the mostfamous of whom was Kermit Roosevelt, a veteran CIA coupmaster who had workedclosely with G. K. Young of MI6 on Project Ajax, the 1953 coup against Mossadegh inIran. Young's action plan had been adopted by the CIA; infiltrated into Iran,Roosevelt reported to Young, based in Cyprus. Another former senior CIA officer onthe WISC Committee was Robert Komer who had worked as an intelligence analystin the Directorate of Intelligence and the Office of National Estimates from 1947 to1960. He then served on the National Security Council until 1965 when he wasappointed Special Assistant to the President. In February 1967, he was posted toSaigon with ambassadorial rank to take over responsibility for all civil and militarypacification programmes in Vietnam, previously run by Sir Robert Thompson, Headof the British Advisory Mission to Vietnam from 1961 to 1965. Together with hisdeputy (and, in November 1968, his successor) William Colby, a former covertoperations chief in the CIA’s East Asia Division, Komer would be the main architectof the notorious Phoenix programme (183).In 1968, Komer was appointed Ambassador to Turkey but had to resign fromthe post before Senate confirmation of the appointment following growingcontroversy about allegations of war crimes committed under the Phoenixprogramme. Komer then left public service and joined the Rand Corporation, writinga study of the Malayan Emergency for them in 1972 which was "a celebration ofThompson's counter-revolutionary expertise". He would continue to be consulted byhigh political circles, particularly during the Carter Administration whose nationalsecurity policy was coordinated by fellow WISC Committee member Brzezinski.Komer also found favour with Carter's Secretary of Defence Harold Brown; Komeraccompanied Brown on his groundbreaking trip to China between 4th-13th January1980 when Brown solicited Chinese aid for the covert war against the Soviet troopsoccupying Afghanistan. The negotiations were successful; on 24th January, theUnited States granted Most Favoured Nation trading status to China, whilst Chinareciprocated over the following six months by supplying weapons to the Afghanmujaheddin and granting unprecedented permission for the CIA and NSA to set uptwo electronic listening posts at Qitai and Korla in Xinjiang (184).Komer was not the only expert in counter-revolutionary warfare to figure onthe WISC Committee; another WISC Committee member was Dr. George KilpatrickTanham, an expert on South Asia for the Rand Corporation since 1955. Tanhamserved as Associate Director for Counter-Insurgency at the US Agency forInternational Development in South Vietnam from 1964 to 1965, then as SpecialAssistant for Counter-Insurgency to the American Ambassador to Thailand from1968 to 1970 before returning to America to work as Vice-President of the RandCorporation’s Washington office from 1970 to 1982. Tanham would take over asPresident of the WISC late in 1975 when the first President, James Theberge who ispresented below, was appointed Ambassador to Nicaragua; WISC would then moveinto the Rand Corporation’s Washington office (185).Another WISC Committee member with CIA connections was NSIC PresidentFrank Barnett; the NSIC was also represented on the WISC Committee by AdmiralWilliam C. Mott, a former Commander-in-Chief of Pacific Forces. The NSIC was notthe only geopolitical study group which had a representative on the WISCCommittee; as mentioned above, American Security Council Board member AdmiralJohn S. McCain Jnr, another former Commander-in-Chief of Pacific Forces, was oneof the USCISC's founding members.The WISC Committee also included four academics with links to the CIA, thefirst being James Theberge, who acted as the WISC's first President. Having firstspent a year from 1969 to 1970 as a Research Associate at St Antony's CollegeOxford, close to MI6, Theberge then became Director of Latin American studies atthe Georgetown Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), the ivory towerfor CIA retirees. There, Theberge would write two books for publication by CSIS,Soviet Naval Power in the Caribbean and Russia in the Caribbean, in which Thebergelaunched the propaganda myths of a camp run by Koreans for training Chileanguerrillas, and a KGB plan for a Chilean submarine base. The CIA would make useof Theberge's books as part of their destabilisation campaign against Allende byensuring that the two books were quoted at length in the Chilean Press, notably inthe CIA-funded El Mercurio, just before the March elections (186). In late 1975,Theberge was appointed US Ambassador to Nicaragua, a post he filled until 1977;Tanham replaced him as President of the WISC.The second university professor to serve on the WISC Committee wasProfessor Edward Shils, a Fellow of Peterhouse, Cambridge, Professor of Sociologyat Chicago University and Chairman of the Wharton School at the University ofPennsylvania. Shils would take over publication of the magazine Encounter after theCongress for Cultural Freedom was exposed as a CIA front in 1967. From 1975 to1977, Shils would serve on the ISC Study Group on Higher Education whichproduced a Special Report on "communist subversion in the education system"(187).Another academic on the WISC Committee in 1975 was the SovietologistProfessor Richard Pipes. Pipes had been working with the ISC since at least late1973 when he served on an ISC Middle East Study Group whose findings would bepublished in March 1974 as the Special Report Soviet Objectives in the Middle East.In 1976, a year after the foundation of the WISC, CIA Director George Bush wouldask Pipes to work with General Daniel O. Graham, Director of the DefenceIntelligence Agency DIA in 1975-76, on the staff of a new CIA thinktank calledTeam B. Team B was tasked to 'beef up' the CIA's assessment of the Soviet threat,which was considered to be too soft on Communism, so as to highlight an alleged"missile gap". Pipes would later be an adviser on Soviet Affairs to the NationalSecurity Council and a Professor at Harvard University (188).The fourth university professor on the WISC Committee was also aSovietologist who had worked for the CIA, Professor Robert F. Byrnes. Byrnes hadserved in the CIA's Office of National Estimates between 1951 and 1954; from 1979onwards, Byrnes would be a member of the Board of Directors of Radio Free Europe,the radio station long financed by the CIA.A final member of note of the WISC Committee was Adolph W. Schmidt,former American Ambassador to Canada. Schmidt also had contacts in theintelligence community, having served in the OSS, the precursor of the CIA, from1942 to 1946. In 1957, he would be part of the American delegation to NATO beforemoving on in 1959 to the Atlantic Congress in London, returning to NATO in 1962.In 1967, he was an adviser to the US Commission for Europe before serving asAmbassador to Canada between 1969 and 1974. A year after the foundation ofWISC, Schmidt would meet the core members of the Cercle complex at a CEDICongress; he would go on to serve on the Advisory Board of Frank Barnett’s NSIC atleast until 1984 (189).As can be judged from this list of Board members, the Cercle could count onfriends on the highest levels of the intelligence and political hierarchy in the UnitedStates. Pinay himself had a privileged relationship with Nixon and Kissinger,personally handing the two men the Cercle-sponsored ISC Special Report EuropeanSecurity and the Soviet Problem in 1972; he would visit them again later in 1975 tolobby for the ISC. The foundation of the WISC would ensure that, despite Nixon’s fallfrom power, the Cercle would continue to enjoy unparalleled access to the Americannational security apparatus under both Presidents Ford and Carter. Within a year ofthe WISC’s creation, Pipes would be working on the CIA's re-assessment of theSoviet threat and later act as adviser to the National Security Council. Brzezinskiwould serve on the NSC throughout the Carter Presidency and fill the top job ofNational Security Adviser to the President from 1977 to 1981.One opportunity in the US came only months later in May 1975, when theInternal Security Subcommittee of the Senate Committee on the Judiciary, run byRobert A. Fearey, convened for hearings on international terrorism. One majorwitness was Brian Crozier who records: "My rôle, although it was not spelt out, wasto define various types of terrorism and above all to produce the evidence (which theState Department was anxious to conceal) of the key rôle of the Soviet Union and itssatellites in the recruiting, training and financing of terrorist gangs. The tacticworked. Not only were my speech and answers to questions written into the record,but so were extensive extracts of my Institute's publications" (190). Fearey providedCrozier with a second opportunity ten months later; in March 1976, Fearey chaired amajor international conference on terrorism in Washington, whose keynote speakerwas Crozier, accompanied on the podium by Robert Moss and two other ISC authorswhom we will meet later, Hans Josef Horchem and Professor Paul Wilkinson.1975 - 1976CRISES AND CONTINUATIONEXPOSURE AND RELAUNCHTurning back to the spring of 1974, the Cercle complex's domestic andinternational operations were reaching new heights; indeed at this time, Crozierresigned as Chairman of FWF to turn his attention fully to the ISC and itsinternational contacts via the Cercle. Iain Hamilton, "fully conscious and in touchwith the CIA officers in London" took over as Chairman (191). Unbeknownst toCrozier and the Cercle, the first of two major leaks was about to expose the CIAsponsorship of Forum World Features. The seeds of disaster were sown in the springof 1974 by the publication of the groundbreaking book The CIA and the Cult ofIntelligence by CIA veteran Victor Marchetti and former State Department Intelligenceofficial John D. Marks. Although the CIA temporarily staved off the crisis by forcingthe suppression of 168 passages from the book, several of which referred to FWF asa CIA operation and one of which named Crozier specifically, it could only be amatter of time before the FWF's cover was definitively blown.The blow would come a year later. Ironically the leak that would expose FWFand then the ISC came not from a CIA dissident like Marchetti but from the heart ofthe CIA itself. Due to the CIA's sloppy security procedures, a British World in Actiontelevision crew filming at CIA Headquarters in Langley in April 1975 caught sight ofa very explosive CIA memorandum. Dated May 1968, the memorandum was fromthen-IOD head Cord Meyer (192) to CIA Director Richard Helms and described CIAfunding of Forum World Features, stating: "In its first two years, FWF has providedthe United States with a significant means to counter Communist propaganda, andhas become a respected feature service well on the way to a position of prestige inthe journalism world". A handwritten note on the document also indicated that FWFwas "run with the knowledge and cooperation of British Intelligence". At the sametime, the CIA discovered that Marchetti and Marks were planning to release thesuppressed material in London. The CIA took the decision to close down FWF in May1975, just ahead of the publication in June of an article The CIA Makes the News inthe alternative London weekly Time Out which quoted Cord Meyer's 1968memorandum (193).The closure of FWF after the exposure of its CIA links was only the firstsetback; no doubt due to the Press revelations about FWF, the offices of the ISC wereburgled in June 1975, and some 1,500 documents were taken. Many of thedocuments found their way to Time Out which published further long articles inAugust and September detailing the ISC's links to the British, American and SouthAfrican intelligence communities (194). The revelations however largely overlookedthe ISC’s international collaboration with the Cercle, even though the haul from theInstitute’s offices had included the January 1972 Council minutes describing Cerclesponsorship of the ISC Special Report and their £20,000 grant to the ISC for 1973,and also an internal ISC memo dated 2nd June 1975, detailing a very recent meetingbetween the ISC and the Cercle held at Ditchley Park in May:"Mr. Crozier told the meeting that after the conference at Ditchley Park, thePinay group should organize similar sessions in Madrid, Rome, Milan,Brussels and Bonn in the autumn with the object of raising money for theInstitute and enhancing its reputation" (195).Crozier records that the conference was a study group which yielded a furtherISC Special Report, New Dimensions of Security in Europe. Amongst the notableparticipants were Pinay himself, Carlo Pesenti and another Italian business leader,Cefis of Marconi. A helicopter had to be sent to pick up "the aged President Pinay",but whilst certainly elderly, Pinay was still sprite: as well as attending the DitchleyPark conference, Pinay made an extensive European tour of prominent Cerclefriends throughout 1975 to muster support for Crozier's Institute. Amongst those hevisited were Richard Nixon, Henry Kissinger, Pope Paul VI, Manuel Fraga Iribarne(then Spanish Ambassador in London), Franz Josef Strauss, Giulio Andreotti andPrince Bernhard of Holland, President of the Bilderberg Group (196). With such apowerful coalition of political and intelligence contacts to call on, the ISC overcameits temporary crisis (197) and intensified its activities, notably through a newalliance of the British Right, the National Association for Freedom (NAFF).NAFF AND SHIELDOne month after the Cercle launched its international campaign to raise theprofile of the ISC, a new organization was formed to bring together the variousgroups that were "concerned about the relentless spread of subversion" (198). Thenew group, the National Association For Freedom (NAFF), was formed in July1975, although not formally founded until December. NAFF's first action in August1975 was to organize a seminar on subversion where veteran espionage journalistand MI5 friend Chapman Pincher served as guest speaker. By mid-1977, NAFFboasted 30,000 members (199). The list of members of the Executive and NationalCouncil of the NAFF shows that the new alliance was a merger of the SIF, the ISCand the Tory Right, including many of the figures involved in the anti-Labouroperations of the past two years.The Director of the NAFF and first editor of its bulletin The Free Nation wasRobert Moss. Moss enjoyed close links to the Conservative leadership and wouldsoon become one of Thatcher's favourite speechwriters - it was Moss who would cointhe term "Iron Lady" for her, first used by Thatcher in a speech in January 1976,only six weeks after NAFF's foundation. Alongside Moss on the NAFF Executive, wefind Norris McWhirter, a member of the SIF National Executive, and author with hisbrother Ross of the NAFF Charter. Ross McWhirter would be assassinated by the IRAjust before NAFF's official launch in December 1975 (200).With Moss and McWhirter on the NAFF Executive was Michael Ivens, theDirector of the anti-union outfit Aims for Industry. Aims for Industry had bankrolledmany of the anti-Labour operations in the early 1970s; it also provided the start-upcapital for NAFF. Like McWhirter, Ivens had also served on the SIF NationalExecutive. Aims for Industry was further represented on the National Council ofNAFF by William E. Luke, a Board member of Aims since 1958. A former MI5 officerduring the war, Luke later served as Chairman of the London Committee of theSouth Africa Foundation and in 1965 was the founding Chairman of the UK-SouthAfrica Trade Association, active in the pro-Pretoria campaign (201).The NAFF National Council also included the indefatigable Crozier, whoprovided NAFF with their first offices - in Kern House, headquarters of Forum WorldFeatures. Several other ISC friends would serve on the NAFF National Council,amongst them the Czech exile Josef Josten, who ran the Free Czech InformationNews Agency, close to MI6. Josten would be the channel for dissemination of theallegations made by Czech defector Josef Frolik. Another ISC friend on the NAFFNational Council was Dr Kenneth Watkins, an author of pamphlets published byAims. A month before NAFF's foundation, Watkins had joined an ISC Study Groupon Communist subversion in higher education that included Lord Vaizey of theDitchley Foundation and Professor Edward Shils of the WISC Committee. The StudyGroup's findings would be published as an ISC Special Report, The Attack on HigherEducation, in September 1977.Alongside Crozier in the National Council of NAFF was another of the keyactors in the counter-subversion lobby, ex-Deputy Director of MI6, G. K. Young,founder of the Unison Committee for Action. As Chairman of SIF, Young broughtwith him into NAFF almost all of SIF's leaders; besides McWhirter and Ivens whoserved with Moss as NAFF's "inner core" on the Executive, SIF recruits to NAFF alsoincluded Bilderberger Sir Frederic Bennett, Chairman of the SIF ParliamentaryGroup, and John Biggs-Davison, former Chairman of the Monday Club, member ofthe SIF National Executive and Deputy Shadow Minister for Northern Ireland underAirey Neave.Biggs-Davison would be joined in NAFF by other top Tory MPs from theMonday Club, notably the former MI6 officer Sir Stephen Hastings and WinstonChurchill, both of whom were members of Thatcher's Shadow Cabinet. Also on theNAFF National Council were three other members of Thatcher's Shadow Cabinet whowould later hold ministerial office in Thatcher's government: Rhodes Boyson, DavidMitchell and Nicholas Ridley.The NAFF National Council also included three senior military figures, two ofwhom would serve on the ISC Council. The first was Vice-Admiral Sir Louis Le Bailly,who had just retired as Director-General of Intelligence at the Ministry of Defence(202). The second ISC Council member on the NAFF Council was Sir RobertThompson, a leading counter-insurgency expert with experience in Malaya. The thirdmilitary figure was Field Marshal Sir Gerald Templer, a former Chief of Staff of theArmy who had implemented Thompson's counter-insurgency strategy during theMalayan campaign. At the time he joined NAFF, Templer occupied a key post forthose fighting subversion: as Lord-Lieutenant of London, he was in charge of allcontingency planning for Military Assistance to the Civil Power. Templer had alsoplayed a part in the genesis of the private armies by introducing G. K. Young toMajor General Sir Walter Walker, the former Commander-in-Chief of NATO forcesin Northern Europe. Walker of the Gurkhas was a former Malayan colleague ofTempler and Thompson's, having founded the Jungle Warfare School during theMalayan Emergency and served as head of Britain's counter-insurgency campaign inBorneo in 1962-64. Walker worked with Young within Unison before splitting off toform Civil Assistance. Throughout 1976, Civil Assistance held long negotiationswith NAFF about a possible merger of the two groups; the talks were abandoned inOctober 1976 when Civil Assistance shut down due to lack of active support.The NAFF National Council also included an impressive array of the leaders ofindustry - Lord de L'Isle of Phoenix Assurance who functioned as NAFF's President,Sir Frank Taylor of Taylor Woodrow, ex-CBI chief Sir Paul Chambers and SirRaymond Brookes, Chairman of GKN Engineering, a member of the CBI Council anda member of William Luke's UK-South Africa Trade Association.As to the day-to-day running of NAFF, Crozier records: "To avoid the delaysimplicit in formal Council meetings, a small group of us decided to function as aninformal action committee, without reporting to the Council. Bill De L'Isle presided,and the other members were Winston Churchill MP, John Gouriet, a former Guardsofficer and merchant banker, Robert Moss and myself" (203).By bringing together the ISC, SIF, leading industrialists and top Tories fromThatcher's Shadow Cabinet, NAFF acted as an unprecedented alliance between theoperators from the counter-subversion lobby and the candidate they worked topromote. On the links between Thatcher and NAFF, I can do no better than to quoteRobin Ramsay and Stephen Dorril:"NAFF pulled together all the elements of the previous networks: the spooks,the propagandists, the anti-union outfits, and - this is the difference between NAFFand its predecessors - it brought in a group of Tory MPs with connections all the wayto the top of the post-Thatcher Tory Party ... NAFF was formed just after MrsThatcher became leader of the Tory Party. It is difficult not to view it as essentiallyformed around her ... Mrs Thatcher duly gave her public blessing to this group,appearing as guest of honour at NAFF's inaugural subscription dinner in January1977" (204)."In its first eighteen months, NAFF initiated what an intelligence officer wouldhave called 'political actions': legal actions against strikes, propaganda about'scroungers', and 'Marxists' in the Labour Party - and, most spectacularly, its strikebreakingintervention in the strike at the Grunwick factory. These brilliantlysuccessful psychological operations gained them oceans of favourable coverage inthe Tory Press, anticipating (and to some extent, setting) the agenda for theConservative Government of 1979 ... the first Thatcher administration was theNational Association For Freedom Government" (205).Besides these NAFF actions, the counter-subversion lobby kept up thepressure on the Labour Party in the foreign Press: the smears against Labourpoliticians and Heath and Thorpe were channelled across the Atlantic, reachingAmerican newspapers in September and October, 1975. The message was repeatedfor a domestic British audience in January 1976, when Lord Chalfont provided aplatform for Brian Crozier's warnings of the Red Menace in a television programmeon subversion called It Mustn't Happen Here (206).An indication of this close relationship between NAFF and the new Leader ofthe Conservative Party came on the 19th January 1976 when Margaret Thatchergave her historic "Iron Lady" speech - which had been written for her by RobertMoss. However, the close cooperation between NAFF and Thatcher went far beyondspeechwriting and public political support: as Crozier revealed in his memoirs,several members of NAFF would set up a secret advisory committee on security andintelligence matters to brief the Conservative leader. The initiative for the committee,called Shield, came from the ex-MI6 officer and NAFF National Council memberStephen Hastings who would be active in 1977 in giving a Parliamentary platform toNAFF's psy-ops campaigns. On 9th March 1976 at a dinner hosted by Lord de l'Isle,and attended by Margaret Thatcher and NAFF founding members Crozier, Moss,Gouriet and McWhirter, the creation of the Shield committee was given the go-ahead(207). The timing for Shield's creation could not have been more critical; within days,the Labour Prime Minister Harold Wilson resigned, worn down by the psy war foughtby his enemies within the British counter-subversion lobby, MI5, MI6, the CIA andBOSS. In the vacuum created by Wilson's mid-term resignation, NAFF and theirfriends in MI5 and MI6 feared that Michael Foot, the left-wing candidate, might beWilson's successor. NAFF caused a storm in April 1976 by publishing an editorial inthe Free Nation urging the Queen to dissolve Parliament and call fresh elections if aLabour government under Foot were to succeed Wilson. Another article alongsideCrozier's was written by "a recently retired counter-subversion chief of MI5". Thiswas almost certainly Dirk Hampden, who had been MI5 Head of Counter-Subversion in June 1975 at the time of the exposure of Forum World Features (208).THE CERCLE’S ALPINE ALLIESWhilst the counter-subversion lobby mounted their campaign in Britainagainst "Communist infiltration" of the government and the unions, Karl-FriedrichGrau and his Frankfurt Study Group had also been spreading much the samemessage from the ISP’s safe refuge over the Swiss border. At the same time, Grauwas the lynchpin of the German PEU section, acting as its Federal Secretary throughuntil 1975. Whilst cooperation between the Belgian, French, British and Germancomponents of the Cercle went well in the period 1974-76, Grau himself ran intocontroversy, first in Germany, then in Switzerland.Grau's far-right views became an embarrassment for the CDU party hierarchywhen it was revealed in early 1974 that he had held meetings with militants of theneo-fascist NPD party with a view to concluding an alliance for the Hesse regionalelections. The controversy led to the resignation in May of five CDU MPs from Grau'sFrankfurt group, the Studiengesellschaft für staatspolitische Öffentlichkeitsarbeit(Study Group for Political Communication) and Grau's formal exclusion from theCDU in June. In the interim, the co-founder of the Study Group, the CDU's Dr.Walter Hoeres, took over as President. The storm did not last long however, and in aStudy Group circular in November, Grau could boast that the loss of the five CDUmembers had been offset by applications for membership from CSU MPs. In anycase, Grau's services as clandestine fundraiser for the CDU/CSU were too valuableto lose, and the CDU quietly readmitted him in May 1976 in time for the nationalelections (209).Grau would score a coup for his Swiss group, the ISP, in early 1976 when hegot the agreement of Swiss Air Force General Ernst Wetter to act as President of theISP; at the time, Wetter was Head of Personnel in the Département Militaire Fédéral(DMF), the Swiss Ministry of Defence. However, Grau's coup rebounded on him andbecame an own goal; a few months later, Wetter was forced to resign from the ISPPresidency by the DMF which did not take kindly to Swiss military personnel usingtheir rank in their private lives. The incident led to an investigation of the ISP andtrouble for Grau. To obtain Wetter's agreement, Grau had claimed that the threeInternational Vice-Presidents of the ISP were the CDU foreign and defence policyspokesman Dr Werner Marx, Jean Violet, and a Viennese lawyer called WolframBitsonau. Grau had the habit of using people's names without taking the trouble ofasking them, and, on checking, all three men denied any knowledge of being anInternational Vice-President of the ISP.The denials ring hollow: although they may never have actually held officewithin the ISP, all three men had links with Grau. Marx had been a longstandingspeaker for Grau’s Frankfurt Study Group, even if he had been one of the five CDUMPs to “leave” the Study Group after the 1974 scandal about Grau’s contacts withthe NPD. Together with Huyn, Marx had also represented Germany on theInternational Council of CEDI since at least 1972. As for Violet, Grau was one of theearliest and closest allies of Violet's AESP, and several AESP members includingHabsburg and Huyn spoke regularly at ISP seminars. Bitsonau also had connectionsto Grau via the AESP; the following year, 1977, Academy documents would listBitsonau as an AESP member in his capacity of President of the Institut fürInternationale Zukunftstudien (Institute for International Studies of the Future)(210). The official investigation into the ISP drew attention to the murky nature ofGrau's political activities, and he was issued with a formal warning by the Swissgovernment in May 1976. Following a parliamentary question, the Swiss governmentdeclared "Mr. Grau has received a warning for interference in Swiss internal affairsand for undesirable political activities and has been threatened with expulsion underArticle 70 of the Federal Constitution" (211). Whilst Grau had to tone down hisoperations for a while, the Swiss government would never follow up on its threat toexpel him.What then were these "undesirable political activities" of Grau's thatinterfered with Swiss internal affairs? An examination of some of the ISP'sconferences in 1975 and 1976 shows that Grau was doing in Switzerland exactlywhat the ISC had started doing in Britain in 1972: giving seminars on Communistsubversion to government and police officials. One of the ISP's subversion seminarswas held between 29th September and 3rd October 1975 in the Tenigerbad Hotel inRabius; with heavy irony, a poster in the hotel lobby announced an "AgriculturalSeminar on Pest Control". Inside, the keynote speaker on "farming" was GeneralReinhard Gehlen, former head of the BND. One third of the audience were officersfrom the Swiss political police; apart from Grau's Swiss partner Dr Peter Sager of theSOI, all the other speakers were Germans.The conference timetables for two further ISP seminars on industrialsubversion and counter-espionage in March 1976 give us a fuller picture of the ISP's"undesirable activities". At their height, the seminars were held at the rate of two amonth; each lasted five days and included some fifteen presentations by governmentor police officials from Germany, Switzerland and several other countries.The first of the two March 1976 seminars opened with a presentation by ErnstWetter, at that time still President of the ISP. Then Grau gave a lengthy introductionto the ISP before handing over to the keynote speaker, Dr Peter Sager of the SOI whospoke on "the global political situation in the politico-revolutionary war: an analysisof psychological warfare". In the afternoon, a certain Mr. I Reinartz closed the firstday of the seminar with a speech on "the importance of industry for Communiststrategy and tactics - the company as the battlefield of Communism". Reinartz alsogave the morning lecture on the second day on the subject of "the destabilization ofcompanies by radical left-wing forces - from agitation to action"; the afternoonincluded two presentations on "protection of data from internal or external access"and "the Communist intelligence services - mission, organization, function". Theseminar would follow the same vein for the five days, giving details of technical andhuman resources for industrial espionage and counter-tactics against Communistsubversion of industry. Inspector W. Dibbern from the Criminal Police, for example,spoke on "the protection of the State today - modern forms of defence" and "when,where and how an infiltration is mounted - how the agent works".Another five-day ISP subversion seminar was held at the end of March 1976,and covered much the same topics. This time however, the keynote speaker was notDr Sager but Lt-Colonel Ernst Cincera, the most notorious figure in Swissparapolitics whose long history of collecting files on "subversives" is described below.At the seminar, Cincera spoke on "the clandestine struggle on all levels", a themethat was picked up by the following speaker Dr Kurt Klein, Director of the GermanArmy’s Psychological Warfare School in Euskirchen, who gave two presentations onindustrial subversion. Chief Commissioner Georg Pohl of the German Criminal Policespoke on "terrorism and anarchism in the Federal Republic - a threat to trade andindustry", and retired Colonel Rudolf Mischler closed the seminar with three lectureson "action in case of attack by explosive or incendiary bombs (with practicalexamples)", "what to do in case of attack and hostage-taking?" and "preparations forsabotage and counter-measures".No wonder the Swiss, touchy about their neutrality, found Grau's seminarsundesirable. An ISP speakers' list for 1975 gives us more information about who wasworking with Grau in the ISP. Grau himself was of course the most frequentspeaker, speaking fourteen times in 1975. Grau's speeches concentrated on the RedMenace with titles such as "Is the Bolchevisation of Europe inevitable?" and "Thestrategy of Communism's clandestine forces". Military psy-ops expert Dr Kurt Kleinwould be a regular fixture, contributing no less than thirteen speeches such as"Soviet espionage in Germany" and "Areas of activity for Communist clandestineforces in Germany". Dr Walter Hoeres, at this time standing in for Grau as Presidentof the Frankfurt-based parent group, would speak eight times throughout the year.Dr Peter Sager would speak at three seminars in 1975 on predictable themes suchas "The changing face of Communism - a narcotic to dupe the West" and "Why theCommunists in the non-communist world do not want peace". At this time, the SOIwas expanding its activities, adding a second monthly review SOI-Bilanz to its bimonthlyjournal Zeitbild (212).Certainly the most controversial Swiss guest of the ISP, speaking at at leasteight seminars in 1975-76, was Lt-Colonel Ernst Cincera who would soon becomethe subject of a national scandal in November 1976. "Colonel Ernst Cincera, memberof the Radical Party, is well-known for his long and stormy activity as a 'snooper'.Carried out as a private citizen, his activities benefited from close cooperation withthe Federal Military Department (DMF) ... Cincera's information was included on theDMF microfilm files and Cincera worked in extremely close coordination with RenéSchmid's bureau, the DMF's specialist 'counter-subversion' unit" (213).For many years, Cincera had been running a private counter-subversionservice called Informationsgruppe Schweiz (Information Group Switzerland) whichfrom 1974 on published its denunciations in the private bulletinWasWerWieWannWo - Information über Agitation und Subversion des politischenExtremismus in der Schweiz (WhatWhoHowWhenWhere - information on agitationand subversion by political extremists in Switzerland). Cincera and his agentsworked closely with the Schmid bureau, a secret counter-subversion unit set upwithin the DMF's Health Department under the leadership of Colonel René Schmid,Chief Medical Officer of the Swiss Army (214). The exchange of information betweenCincera's group and the Schmid bureau was direct: in 1975, one of Cincera's youngagents, Andreas Kühnis, supplied the Schmid bureau directly with a list ofparticipants at a seminar organized by the Salecina Foundation. On the orders ofColonel Schmid, his bureau then sent back to Cincera's group a request for furtherinformation and included for each "suspect" an identity photo and a specimensignature drawn from the DMF's personnel records (215). In exchange for itsservices, Cincera's group regularly received DMF files from the Schmid bureau, acase of illegal access which would be exposed - with the help of Andreas Kühnis - bymembers of the Democratic Manifesto in November 1976. The national scandal thatensued would be repeated the following year when the members of the DemocraticManifesto revealed that over 1,700 pages of material from Cincera were stocked onone single computer cassette amongst the thousands held by the Army in itsMIDONAS database, the Military Document Reference System, which included allarticles written about the Swiss Army and military service.Cincera's material included personal and political data on each "suspect", oneof whom was journalist Jürg Frischknecht of the Tages-Anzeiger, one of the authorsof Unheimliche Patrioten. Frischknecht's case shows the kind of cooperation betweenCincera's network and Grau's ISP. At the second ISP seminar in March 1976,described above, Grau had accepted to answer written questions from Frischknecht,but in fact never did so. In 1977, when the members of the Democratic Manifestoobtained the MIDONAS cassette, they found in Cincera's file on Frischknecht the listof questions that he had submitted to Grau the previous year. The DMF kept anembarrassed silence about its cooperation with Cincera, but the newspaper close toCincera, Abendland, confirmed the facts: "One of the people responsible for settingup the DMF's new computer system stayed in contact with Mr. Cincera for severalmonths to clarify to what extent his archives could be linked to this informationsystem" (216).Despite his notoriety, Cincera would be a frequent speaker at ISP seminars,speaking no less than seven times in 1975 as well as his contribution to the March1976 seminar mentioned above. His subjects included "agitation and subversion asa means of Communist strategy" and "agitation against the Army - agitation withinthe Army" (217). Amongst the other ISP speakers, we find a rare British guest –Reginald Steed, foreign policy lead writer for the Daily Telegraph in the mid- to late1960s, who would speak four times for the ISP in 1975 – as well as the main figuresof the Cercle's German network of friends. Habsburg himself would speak at four ISPseminars in 1975; he had been contributing articles to Grau's Frankfurt StudyGroup since at least 1965. The CSU foreign policy spokesman Count Hans Huynwould be one of the most frequent speakers for the ISP, giving eight lectures at ISPseminars in 1975. His presentations at the ISP were mostly on his specialist themeof Ostpolitik, Germany's relationship with Eastern Europe.Besides the Swiss ISP and Belgian AESP, Huyn would also work with Grauwithin another group, the Deutschland-Stiftung (Germany Foundation), a politicaltrust founded in Munich in 1966 which brought together many German right-wingpoliticians. The Foundation published the journal Deutschland-Magazin and awardedthe Adenauer Prize, an event given Oscar-like coverage by the German conservativePress. The founding President of the Deutschland-Stiftung was Professor GeorgStadtmüller, an expert on Eastern Europe for Hitler. A trio of early Germanmembers of the AESP would serve within the Deutschland-Stiftung - Grau was itsVice-President, von Merkatz sat on its Honorary Presidium, and Huyn served on itsBoard. Another member of the Foundation's Board from 1968 on was the aristocrat,former Nazi party member and wartime officer in Gehlen's FHO Professor FreiherrBolko von Richthofen; he would be excluded from the Deutschland-Stiftung in1972 for his overt support for the neo-nazi NPD party. Richthofen also acted asBoard member of SOI's German support group, founded by Grau and Sager in 1961.Several other members of the Deutschland-Stiftung were also friends of Grau's ISP,amongst them Dr. Walter Hoeres, co-founder of the ISP's Frankfurt parent body anda frequent speaker at the ISP's seminars on subversion, and Brigadier-GeneralHeinz Karst who would speak at six of the ISP's seminars in 1975.The close links between the Deutschland-Stiftung and Grau's ISP would beillustrated by one incident when the Deutschland-Magazin quoted Grau's smearbulletin intern-informationen in accusing German Minister Horst Ehmke of contactswith the Czech secret service. After losing a libel suit, the Deutschland-Magazin wasforced to retract its allegations - Grau however could continue to publish them withimpunity from intern-informationen's address in Switzerland (218). The Deutschland-Magazin would also work closely with the magazine Zeitbild published by Sager'sSOI; as we have seen, it was Grau, Vice-President of the Deutschland-Stiftung, whodistributed SOI's publications in Germany (219). When SOI celebrated its jubilee in1984, it was attended by the President of the Deutschland-Stiftung from 1977 to1994, Gerhard Löwenthal.Gerhard Löwenthal was, with Grau and Huyn, perhaps the most importantright-wing multifunctionary in Germany throughout the 1970s and 1980s (220).Born in Berlin in 1922 as the son of a Jewish businessman, Löwenthal survivedinternment in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. However, the Communist takeoverin East Berlin radicalised him, and he joined the PEU in 1947. Having started acareer in broadcasting in 1945 with the American Occupation Forces station RIAS(Radio in the American Sector), Löwenthal was appointed RIAS Deputy Director in1951, later moving over to the Berlin radio station Sender Freies Berlin after itscreation in 1954. After a spell working at the OECD in Paris from 1959 to 1963,Löwenthal returned to broadcasting, joining the second German television channelZDF as its European Correspondent and head of the Brussels bureau. He wouldhowever soon rise to become one of Germany's most prominent televisionanchormen as presenter of the fortnightly current affairs programme, ZDF Magazin,which he would present from January 1969 right through until December 1987.This programme gave Löwenthal the media power and public recognition of a RobinDay or a Jeremy Paxman, television access which he used to focus heavily on Sovietrepression in Eastern Europe and particularly in East Germany. He was a closepolitical ally of Franz Josef Strauss who was a frequent guest on Löwenthal'sprogramme; Brian Crozier would also later benefit from television airtime thanks toLöwenthal. Löwenthal also had excellent contacts with the BND and particularlywith Gerhard Wessel, Gehlen's deputy during and after the war and his successoras BND President from 1968 to 1980; Löwenthal was a frequent personal guest ofWessel's at BND headquarters (221).An early example of cooperation between Löwenthal and the Cercle complex'sGerman contacts was the creation in 1973 of the Freie Gesellschaft zur Förderungder Freundschaft mit den Völkern der Tschechoslovakei (Free Society for thePromotion of Friendship with the Peoples of Czechoslovakia). Alongside Löwenthal asfounding members of the Free Society we find three future speakers at Grau's ISPsubversion seminars: Count Hans Huyn, Ludek Pachmann and Walter Becher.Ludek Pachmann was a Czech exile and former Chess Grand Master who wouldgive five presentations on Czechoslovakia at ISP seminars in 1975. Throughout the1970s and 1980s, Pachmann would be an inseparable sidekick of Löwenthal’s, aGerman Crozier-Moss act. Walter Becher was from the Sudetenland, the Germanspeakingpart of the Czech Republic. In 1931, Becher joined the SudetendeutschePartei (Sudeten German Party) led by Konrad Henlein, who would be appointedReichskommissar of the Sudetenland when it was annexed by Hitler in October1938; Becher then joined Hitler's NSDAP (Nazi Party). He would play a prominentpart after the war in exile politics, sitting in the Bavarian Parliament for a smallexiles' party between 1950 and 1962. In 1965, he was elected to the German FederalParliament; after joining the CSU in 1967, he would continue in the FederalParliament as a CSU MP until 1980. Besides his parliamentary rôle where he wasone of the most outspoken opponents of Brandt's Ostpolitik, Becher would alsospeak at an ISP seminar on subversion in 1975; the ISP's speakers' list gave Becher'saddress as Pullach bei München, the location of the BND's headquarters, where hestill lived when he died in 2005.Two further founding members of the Free Society were Jaroslyv Pechacek,Head of the Czech Division of Radio Free Europe, the CIA-funded radio station, andRainer Gepperth, Director of the International Department of the Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung, the CSU's political foundation, examined in later chapters. The finalfounding member of the Free Society in 1973 was a person with close links to twoearly anti-communist propaganda groups, one in Britain and one in Germany:Cornelia Gerstenmaier.Cornelia Gerstenmaier was the daughter of Eugen Gerstenmaier, from 1954to 1969 the longest serving President of the German Parliament and an early CEDImember. In 1970, she would be one of the founding members of the British-basedCentre for the Study of Religion and Communism, run by Canon MichaelBourdeaux. The CSRC would later change names to Keston College and morerecently to Keston Research, but would remain focused on the same theme: therepression of the freedom of worship in the Communist bloc. It has been alleged thatthe CSRC was an IRD/MI6 front, similar to the ISC in London and the InformationPolicy Unit in Northern Ireland, both created around the same time. The attributionof the CSRC to IRD is given credence by the revelation in Crozier’s memoirs thatshortly before the CSRC's foundation, the IRD had officially curtailed publication ofits own Christian anti-communist output, the Religious Digest (222).The young CSRC certainly had close ties to other intelligence-linkedpropaganda outlets such as the ISC: Bourdeaux was one of the contributors toCrozier's 1970 anthology for Common Cause, We Will Bury You, and the CSRC'spublications were distributed by the same outfit used by the counter-subversionlobby, SOI and INTERDOC: Stewart-Smith's FAPC. The KGB was always interestedin Keston: one of the special tasks for former KGB London Resident Oleg Gordievskywas to monitor Keston's activities, and former KGB Major-General Oleg Kalugin laterconfirmed that the KGB's Counter-Espionage department kept a close eye on Keston(223).However, Cornelia Gerstenmaier's real significance lay in her rôle in runningan organization which acquired a certain notoriety in the 1980s, the InternationaleGesellschaft für Menschenrechte (IGfM) or International Society for Human Rights(ISHR) (224). The IGfM/ISHR was first founded in Frankfurt in 1972 as a purelyGerman organization, the Gesellschaft für Menschenrechte (GfM, Society for HumanRights), which would be chaired from 1973 to 1978 by Gerstenmaier. It is interestingto note that the GfM was founded around the same time as the trio of ISC, Cercleand AESP launched their Helsinki Appeal on human rights; the foundation of theGfM may represent a German pillar to the complex's campaign.The GfM's future political orientation was illustrated by its foundingmembers, who stemmed from the NTS, a group of former Russian Nazi collaboratorsfunded by the CIA and intimately linked to WACL. The founding members of the GfMincluded Ivan Agrusov, President of the NTS, and Leonid Müller, the NTS Treasurer.The IGfM/ISHR also had close connections to the German Right; on the Board of theGfM or IGfM at one time or another were Habsburg, von Merkatz, Pachmann andSager. The GfM became international in 1981, and by 1988 it had 16 foreignsections; its campaigns in the 1980s are described in a later chapter.Another early organization of note created by Löwenthal was theKonzentration Demokratischer Kräfte (KDK, Concentration of Democratic Forces,also known as Korrigiert den Kurs - Correct the Course), a right-wing ginger groupthat campaigned for the CSU. Löwenthal's partner for the 1974 creation of KDK wasDr Lothar Bossle, whom we will meet again in the late 1970s as a partner in theCercle's German operations.No presentation of the Cercle's German friends in the mid-1970s would becomplete without mentioning Hans Josef 'Jupp' Horchem, from 1969 until 1981Director of the Hamburg regional branch of the German security service Bundesamtfür Verfassungsschutz (BfV) or Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution.Having joined the BfV in 1957, Horchem rose to become one of its top analysts onleft-wing extremism before moving over in later years to concentrate on right-wingextremism. Horchem's first known appearance in Cercle matters came in March1973 when he wrote a Conflict Study for the ISC, West Germany: "The Long Marchthrough the Institutions"; this would soon be followed by two further Conflict Studies,West Germany's Red Army Anarchists published in April 1974 and Right-wingExtremism in Western Germany published in November 1975. In March 1976,Horchem joined the ISC trio of Crozier, Moss and Professor Paul Wilkinson asspeakers at a major international conference on terrorism in Washington chaired byRobert Fearey (225). In 1978, he served as a special consultant to the Spanishgovernment in anti-terrorist measures, and from 1980 on would also advise theBasque regional government. In the early 1980s, Horchem would also work closelywith Löwenthal within the right-wing ginger group Konservative Aktion, as well asacting as a prime German channel for Crozier's private secret service, the 6I (226).THE IBERIAN PENINSULAIn the mid 1970s, right-wing fears about the rise of the Left were reinforced bythe fall of the Iberian dictatorships following the Portuguese revolution of April 1974and the death in November 1975 of the Spanish Caudillo. Coming after Wilson'svictory in the February 1974 elections and Mitterrand's favourable position in therun-up to elections in France, the Portuguese revolution provided furtherconfirmation to the Right of a left-wing landslide throughout Europe. The ISC's1974-1975 annual review, the Annual of Power and Conflict, focused specifically onPortugal: "An introductory article by Brian Crozier, the editor, on Subversion and theUSSR makes special reference to the Soviet Union's activities in Portugal" (227), andin his article for the Annual, Western Europe's Year of Confusion, Kenneth Mackenziesummarized the situation in saying: "By early 1975 Portugal looked in distinctdanger of becoming the first country in the Alliance to fall under Communist control"(228).Apart from the weakening of NATO's southern flank, the Portugueserevolution also had strategic implications outside of Europe, due notably to the newPortuguese regime's decision to withdraw from its African colonies of Angola andMozambique, riven by war between Cuban-backed pro-Soviet forces and pro-Western forces supported by the CIA and the Rhodesian Central Intelligence Office.The Portuguese withdrawal from Africa coincided with the death in Spain of abastion of Western values, Caudillo Franco. Following the American doctrine of the"domino theory", the Right feared that Spain would also be contaminated by the"Portuguese disease" and that the left-wing upheaval in Portugal could drag Spaindown with it. The worrying situation of the Iberian peninsula would be one of themajor focuses for the ISC's publications between 1974 and 1976, which includedtwo Special Reports and two Conflict Studies: Revolutionary Challenges in Spain (aSpecial Report by Robert Moss, June 1974), Southern Europe: NATO's CrumblingFlank (June 1975), Portugal - Revolution and Backlash (September 1975) and Portugaland Spain: Transition Politics (May 1976), a Special Report which was the product ofan international seminar held in London in mid-1975 and sponsored by the ISC,Georgetown University's CSIS and the Institute for International Studies of theUniversity of South Carolina.Whilst the geostrategic experts at the ISC alerted their readership to thedanger of a Communist take-over in the Iberian peninsula, the ISC's allies in theCercle complex channelled aid to right-wing leaders in Portugal and Spain throughFranz Josef Strauss and Otto von Habsburg. In Portugal, the main beneficiaries ofCercle support were two putschist Generals who would be central figures in thepolitical developments in Portugal from 1973 to 1976: General Kaulza de Arriaga, aformer Commander of Portuguese Forces in Mozambique and leader of a group ofextreme right-wing Army officers, and General Antonio de Spinola, the futurePresident of the post-revolutionary Junta of National Salvation. Strauss would givegenerous clandestine funding to both Arriaga and Spinola until at least 1979, andboth men would be in contact with the top members of the Cercle Pinay. Within ayear of an attempted coup in March 1975, Arriaga would attend CEDI's 1976 annualCongress in Spain with top Cercle members; according to the reports on the CerclePinay written by Hans Langemann, head of Bavarian State Security, Spinola wouldbe a guest at meetings of the Cercle itself (229).Cercle contacts Arriaga and Spinola would be key actors in the history of thePortuguese revolution and its aftermath. After the death in 1970 of dictator Salazarand his replacement by his deputy since 1968, Marcello Caetano, the extreme rightwingsympathizers in the military became impatient for a return to the good olddays. In December 1973, Arriaga and a group of extreme right-wing officers andpoliticians approached Spinola to canvass his support for a coup against theCaetano government. Spinola however refused to become involved and revealed theplot to Caetano who imprisoned Arriaga and rewarded Spinola by appointing himDeputy Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces. This promotion would however be shortlived;following the furore caused by Spinola's book Portugal and the Future, whichindicated that the wars in Portugal's African colonies could not be ended by militarymeans alone but also required reform at home, both Spinola and his superior CostaGomes were dismissed in March 1974.After the Armed Forces Movement's bloodless coup which overthrew Caetanoon the 25th April, Spinola was appointed President of the seven-man Junta ofNational Salvation on 15th May. However, after rumours of his involvement in aplanned simultaneous counter-coup in Lisbon and Luanda scheduled for the 28thSeptember, Spinola and other conservatives were dismissed on 30th September, andKaulza de Arriaga and three former Caetano ministers were detained. Spinola'ssupporters then went underground; Spinolist Army officers with experience ofcounter-insurgency with the FNLA in Angola joined with former agents of Salazar'sdismantled intelligence and security service PIDE to form a clandestine army, theELP or Army for the Liberation of Portugal. With its cover blown and its offices andarchives seized by the Armed Forces Movement, Aginter Press also took up the fightwithin the ELP: Guérin-Sérac and his lieutenant Jay Salby were prominent ELPcommanders. Other partners of Aginter Press included members of MovimentoIndependente para a Reconstruçao Nacional (MIRN), a group set up by Arriaga afterhis release from prison. Spinola and the ELP made a second coup attempt on 11thMarch, 1975, which also failed, and Spinola was forced to flee Portugal.In exile in Switzerland, Spinola founded the MDLP (Democratic Movement forthe Liberation of Portugal), a coalition of former Caetano officials and members of theELP. Throughout 1975, whilst the ELP carried out several hundred bomb attacks inPortugal to destabilize the government of the left-wing Armed Forces Movement,Spinola travelled around Europe, seeking support for a putsch, should the Left winthe Parliamentary elections to be held on 25th April, 1976, the second anniversary ofthe 1974 revolution. After meeting the CIA's Frank Carlucci in the US base atTorrejon in Spain at the beginning of August, Spinola travelled to Bonn where hemet a key contact: Franz Josef Strauss, who also arranged for Spinola to meet afriend with international influence in the field of finance, Hermann Josef Abs. Abs,described by David Rockefeller as "the leading banker of the world", was a formerhead of the Deutsche Bank who also served as a close adviser to ChancellorAdenauer.Abs had been head of the Deutsche Bank from 1940 to 1945. The DeutscheBank was the Nazis' bank throughout the war; Abs was in effect Hitler's paymaster.Abs was also on the Board of chemicals conglomerate I. G. Farben and participatedat company Board meetings when members discussed the use of slave labour at aFarben rubber factory located in the Auschwitz concentration camp (230). TheDeutsche Bank's collaboration with the Nazi regime did not lead to a purge of itsstaff; after the war, Abs continued on the Board of the bank, serving as spokesmanfor the Board from 1957 to 1967 before being appointed Honorary Chairman of theBoard in 1976.Besides his banking activities, Abs was also one of the key German partnersof Dr Joseph Retinger in his efforts to set up the CIA-funded European Movementand the Bilderberg group. Abs was one of the two leaders of the German section ofthe Independent League for Economic Cooperation, one of the five organizations thatmade up the European Movement (231). Abs was also one of the founding membersof the Bilderberg group, having served on the 1952 organization committee withPinay, Voisin, Ball and Bonvoisin. The friendship between Abs and Strauss datedback to at least the mid-1950s when the two men met at meetings of the Bilderberggroup; Strauss, then Nuclear Power Minister, had attended the Bilderbergconference in Garmisch-Partenkirchen in September 1955. One year before the 1975meeting between Abs, Strauss and Spinola, Abs and Strauss had both attended the1974 Bilderberg conference held in April in Megèze, France (232). Abs was also alongstanding member of CEDI; together with Strauss, Abs attended the XIth CEDICongress in 1963 (233). Together with AESP and CEDI member von Merkatz, Abswas a member of the Europäisches Institut für politische, wirtschaftliche und sozialeFragen (European Institute for political, economic and social issues), which sharedits Munich headquarters with CEDI.After his meeting with Abs, Spinola moved on to Paris, where he met arepresentative of the arms company Merex, founded in 1966 by former SS ColonelGerhard Mertens, a colleague of Otto Skorzeny, the Nazi commando in exile in Spainwho was a major rallying point for European fascism. Besides its links to theextreme Right, Merex also had a close working relationship with the BND (234). InParis, Spinola also had the opportunity of soliciting the support of Westernintelligence agencies for his planned coup, meeting the CIA Head of Station EugenBurgstaller and attending as guest of honour a meeting organized at the ParisSheraton by Colonel Lageneste, in charge of SDECE foreign relations (235). TheSheraton meeting was in fact a major conference bringing together all the anticommunistforces in Portugal; amongst those present were Spinola, CDS partyleader Freitas do Amaral, Manuel Allegre of the Portuguese Socialist Party andJorge Jardim, leader of the Portuguese colonists in Mozambique, who would lateralso meet top Cercle members at the 1976 CEDI Congress. Amaral also had closelinks to the Cercle, as a letter from Habsburg to Damman of 29th August, 1975shows:"I sent replies to your previous letters via Pöcking [the Archduke's Bavarianresidence] because of my trip to Portugal during which - for good reasons - Ididn't dare to write or even take notes. I had very interesting contacts,particularly with the leadership of the CDS, who deserve our support. I amplanning to bring their leaders - this is highly confidential - Amaro da Costaand Freitas do Amaral to Bavaria in the second half of September. In themeanwhile, I have suggested to Mr. Strauss that we should set up PortugalSupport Committees, whose aim would be to give moral and financial supportto the freedom forces in Portugal. We should act as the Communists did inrelation to Vietnam in organizing public demonstrations, collections, appealsand support groups formed by intellectuals, etc. I hope that Strauss willaccept the idea. I don't see why the Communists should be the only ones tosupport their friends or why we should practice non-intervention" (236).By the end of September, Spinola was in Lausanne where he met JohnMcCone, a former director of the CIA who then worked for ITT; ITT promised$300,000 for Spinola's putsch. Despite the support of several foreign intelligenceservices and pledges of several hundred thousand dollars from ITT and othermultinationals, Spinola's plans were wrecked just before the April, 1976 elections byinvestigative journalist Günter Walraff who, posing as a right-wing militant, hadtape-recorded Spinola's conversations about his plans for a putsch (237).In Spain, the death of Caudillo Franco in November 1975 set a challenge forthe Cercle: could the "Portuguese disease" be prevented? From 1975 to 1977,Strauss channelled clandestine funds to a trio of former Franco Ministers who ledparties within the Alianza Popular (AP) coalition, founded in October 1976. We havealready met the most important of the three, AP's founder and President from 1976until 1986: Manuel Fraga Iribarne, Franco's Information Minister from 1962 to1969, Crozier's contact since 1965, and AESP member from 1970 on. From 1973until Franco's death, Fraga Iribarne would serve as Spanish Ambassador in London;he would receive a personal visit there from President Pinay as part of Pinay's 1975European tour to promote the ISC. After Franco's death, Fraga Iribarne returned toSpain in December 1975 to serve in the first post-Franco government as Vice-President of the Government and Interior Minister, and to join the eight-mancommittee that drafted the 1978 Constitution.The other two Strauss beneficiaries were Federico Silva Munoz, leader ofAccion Democratica Espanola and a prominent member of Opus Dei, and CruzMartinez Esteruelas, President of the Union Democratica del Pueblo Espanol; thelatter had served in Franco's last two cabinets as Planning and DevelopmentMinister in 1973 and Education and Science Minister in 1974. All three were givengenerous covert funding by Strauss: in 1977, Fraga Iribarne received at least DM135,000, and Silva Munoz and Martinez Esteruelas DM 100,000 each. FragaIribarne had had an opportunity that year to discuss funding with Strauss; the twomen met in April 1977 at the Bilderberg conference organized in Torquay by SirFrederic Bennett.Strauss's support for Fraga Iribarne would continue well into the 1980s viatheir respective party foundations:"In 1986, like its sister foundation the [CDU’s] Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung, the[CSU's] Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung would choose the same path for backdoor funding ofits activities in favour of the Contras. On the 6-7th October 1986, a seminar on LatinAmerica with representatives from the Contras was held in Geneva, organized by theInstitut Economique de Paris which has close links with the Heritage Foundation.The conference was sponsored amongst others by the Fundacion Canovas [del]Castillo, politically close to the right-wing conservative Alianza Popular. The formerPresident of Alianza Popular - Manuel Fraga Iribarne - is not only an old friend ofStrauss and his CSU, but also a well-known right-wing radical in Spain. TheFundacion Canovas [del] Castillo is supported by the Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung, whichbenefits the Alianza Popular. In 1985 the German Federal Ministry for Cooperation[which gives funds to party foundations like the HSS] approved a grant of 5 millionDM to the HSS for the Madrid foundation" (238).THE AESP, VDB AND PIOWhilst Strauss was funding Franco friends in Spain, and AESP associatesCrozier and Grau were organizing seminars on subversion in Britain and inSwitzerland, the Belgian members of the AESP were active on the domestic front:Defence Minister and AESP member Paul Vanden Boeynants (VdB) and his adviserde Bonvoisin set up a military counter-subversion and propaganda service, thePublic Information Office or PIO. PIO was headed by a longstanding associate ofVdB and de Bonvoisin, Major Jean-Marie Bougerol. Bougerol would be a centralfigure in Belgian parapolitics implicated in previous coup plots: the 1976Gendarmerie report by Roger Tratsaert stated that one of the plans for a coup d'étatin 1973 was jointly organized by the NEM Clubs (funded by VdB and de Bonvoisin)and a group of gendarmes and Army officers centred around Bougerol.PIO's genesis - and that of the coup plots in Belgium and elsewhere - lay inthe political upheaval in America and Europe at the end of the 1960s. By 1970, theArmy had become seriously concerned by the "internal threat" posed by the anti-Vietnam movement and the students' movement after 1968. Moves to create theArmy's own counter-subversion agency bore fruit in April 1970, when Chief ofGeneral Staff Lt-General Georges Vivario (by 1973, part of an AESP delegation)together with Colonel Paul Detrembleur established the Division des ServicesSpéciaux (DSD) as an independent unit reporting directly to the Minister of Defence.The unit, headed by a general, brought together members of the Minister's office andrepresentatives from the General Staff of the Army and the Gendarmerie. Composedof five sections, the DSD's specific task was to counter "protest and subversivepropaganda". Part of its task was to set up a "Speakers Bureau", a pool of militarypersonnel trained as media representatives for public debates, televisionappearances, etc - this bureau would later give birth to PIO. Despite press uproarand the resignation of the Deputy Chief to the General Staff in protest, the creationof the DSD went ahead.New impetus was given to the DSD's work in 1972-73 when the new DefenceMinister, VdB, introduced reforms of the Army including a plan for the "militarydefence of the territory" (DMT) designed to counter leftist/pacifist influence by adramatic reinforcement of the Gendarmerie and greater involvement for the Armyand reserve officers in counter-subversion work. Faced with massive studentprotests in early 1973 against the DMT plan and a tightening of military servicerules, the Army hardened its stance; in a "study on objectivity and the media" dated13th September, 1973, Lt-Col. Weber, head of Counter-Information in the Belgianmilitary intelligence service SDRA (239), wrote in apocalyptic terms of the threat tofreedom and democracy posed by professional agitators within the media and thepeace movement, and urged the creation of a permanent group within the SDRA tocombat subversion. Weber's study came at a critical moment: in mid-August, thePress had reported the existence of a planned coup. Three days before Weber wrotehis study, the Gendarmerie General Staff received Major de Cock's report alleginglinks between VdB, de Bonvoisin and the NEM Clubs (240). Weber's report andsimilar concerns within the Army General Staff led to a decision in 1974 tostrengthen the Army's counter-subversion and propaganda rôles by creating thePublic Information Office PIO, headed by Major Bougerol, as an autonomous groupwithin the Army General Staff.Despite its independent status, PIO had considerable links to the SDRA:Bougerol claims he was given the use of an office within the Counter-Informationsection of SDRA in 1974-75 whilst he was setting up PIO, and one of his closestcollaborators was Commissioner Fagnart of the Military Security section of SDRA.PIO's official mission was twofold: firstly, to expose Soviet disinformation in themedia, largely through the publication of a press review called Inforep. PIO's secondtask was to act as a clearing-house for information on subversion, distributinginformation to the Army, the Gendarmerie, the Sûreté de l'Etat - Belgium's internalsecurity agency, and the Foreign Ministry Security Division. Unofficially, Bougerolused PIO to mount the same kind of aggressive counter-intelligence programmesthat the FBI had been conducting against the Left, the peace movement and theAmerican Indian movement in America from 1969 until at least 1976 (241). It isprobably no coincidence that PIO's title - unusual for being in English in the original- copied FBI jargon:"PIO (Public Information Officer): the FBI classification for the agent whosespeciality is providing intentionally inaccurate "facts" (disinformation) to themedia; the FBI counterpart to the military psychological operations (psy-ops)specialist" (242).Amongst PIO's operations were organized sabotage of left-wing conferences,promotion of groups favourable to the Army, and seminars on Soviet subversion.Through such operations, Bougerol set up a network of unofficial correspondentsbaptised the Miller network, a pseudonym he used when writing for Belgiannewspapers. The 445 known correspondents were a gathering of officers from theSûreté, the SDRA, the Gendarmerie and police, members of the EEC's securitydepartment, militants from the NEM Clubs and other fascist groups, private"security operatives" and innocent or not so innocent journalists (243).To gain experience of counter-intelligence and propaganda operations,Bougerol went on a European tour in 1976, visiting Northern Ireland, Spain,Portugal, Italy, France and Holland. In several of these countries, Bougerol washosted by AESP contacts. It is likely that during his visit to the UK, Bougerol had theopportunity of meeting Brian Crozier and the AESP's partners at the ISC - as we willsee in the next chapter, Bougerol, de Bonvoisin and Crozier had already met inFebruary 1976 at the AESP's IXth AESP Chapter Assembly and would meet again inDecember that year at the CEDI Congress. Bearing in mind that SDRACommissioner Fagnart's 1978 letter, quoted in full below, warned Bougerol "wecould imagine another danger ... if there was a leak about the Saoud affair or theaffairs concerning Formosa, Spain or the UK", it would be interesting to know whatBougerol was up to in the UK. The AESP also provided Bougerol with a host for hisvisit to Italy the same year: Ivan-Matteo Lombardo (244), present at the Parco deiPrincipi birth of the strategy of tension in 1965, a member of the AESP since 1970and implicated in the 1974 Sogno coup only two years earlier.The mention of Formosa in SDRA Commissioner Fagnart's 1978 letter refersto another 1976 trip, this time to Taiwan for training in psychological warfare andcounter-information. In this context, it is interesting to note that the PoliticalWarfare Cadres Academy in Peitou (Taiwan), which trained counter-subversionforces for many of the Latin American death-squad states, had extremely close linksto WACL who both prospected for business for the Academy and recruited WACLmembers from the ranks of Academy graduates (245). The Academy has in fact hadthe closest links with both WACL and the CIA since its foundation: the co-founderswere Chiang Kai Shek's son and Ray S. Cline, CIA Chief of Station in Taipei from1958 to 1962. During this period, Cline was also a channel for financial andlogistical support for the founding meeting of WACL in 1958. Cline would rise tobecome CIA Deputy Director of Intelligence from 1962 to 1966, and, after resigningfrom the CIA in 1969, would serve as Director of the Bureau of Intelligence andResearch (INR) at the State Department, where he contributed considerably to theanti-Allende operations of 1973, the year which saw his official retirement fromintelligence work. The interconnections between the Academy, WACL, the CIA, Clineand Bougerol seem all the more significant in the light of a reference by Cline in a1992 BBC interview about Gladio to "the counter-insurgency training given to theBelgian Major Jean-Marie Bougerol and his men in the US" in the early 1970s (246).Whatever Cline's possible links to Bougerol and PIO in the early 1970s, theCIA veteran and the PIO chief would later share a common friend who did much tohelp PIO - the American disinformationist of Belgian descent, Arnaud deBorchgrave. Arnaud, Comte de Borchgrave d'Altena, sixteenth in line to the Belgianthrone, started his "journalistic" career after the war as a correspondent of Europe-Amerique, forerunner of the Nouvel Europe Magazine subsidized by Bougerol'spolitical master Benoît de Bonvoisin. De Borchgrave then spent a long spell fromVietnam until the Reagan Presidency as a top reporter for Newsweek, ending up asParis bureau chief. During this period, de Borchgrave played a key rôle in thegenesis of PIO; as Bougerol recalled in an interview (247), it was de Borchgrave who,in the early 1970s, introduced Bougerol to PIO's future patron, Benoît de Bonvoisin.According to a May 1981 Sûreté report on de Bonvoisin's contacts in Paris, deBorchgrave also allegedly acted as an intermediary between de Bonvoisin and theCIA (248).In the late 1970s, de Borchgrave was one of PIO's prized foreign presscontacts; when PIO chartered a plane to fly journalists to the Zairean province ofShaba in 1978, the plane had to wait on the tarmac for one late VIP - de Borchgrave.De Borchgrave subsequently filed reports for Newsweek alleging Cuban involvementin the Katangese invasion of Shaba; Moss drew attention to de Borchgrave'sNewsweek articles in a piece he wrote for the Washington-based Policy Review in itsSummer 1978 issue (249). De Borchgrave and Moss were already longstandingfriends; they had met in 1972 when de Borchgrave, in hiding in London after writingan article on Black September for Newsweek, asked to meet a specialist onsubversion (250). The meeting would herald the beginning of a long partnershipbetween the two men which would reach its peak in the 1980s.De Borchgrave would also benefit from close contacts with SDECE chiefAlexandre de Marenches, who, when asked where would be an interesting place tospend the Christmas of 1979, advised de Borchgrave to go to Afghanistan. DeBorchgrave was one of the few Western journalists on the spot during the Sovietinvasion (251). De Borchgrave would be fired as Newsweek Paris bureau chief in1980 after he was discovered to have been building files on his colleagues for severalyears. At the time, he was working with Robert Moss on the first of two notoriousdisinformation novels, The Spike and Monimbo, filled with plots of Soviet subversionlaunched with the assistance of the Sandinista government in Nicaragua and thecomplicity of left-wing journalists in Europe.In 1985, de Borchgrave would become editor-in-chief of the Moonies'newspaper, the Washington Times. The Moonies would be a forum for cooperationbetween de Borchgrave and Cline: Cline was on the Editorial Board of The World andI, the Moonies' monthly edited by de Borchgrave. De Borchgrave was a former Boardmember of the Moonies' US Global Strategy Council, chaired by Cline in the late1980s. Cline and de Borchgrave also shared a platform with William Casey asspeakers at a special conference series on intelligence held at the Ashbrook Center,Ohio in 1986, one of Casey's last public appearances before his death in May 1987.At this time, de Borchgrave was working with Moss and John Rees of the John BirchSociety in a "risk analysis" company, Mid-Atlantic Research Associates (MARA); thethree also edited a monthly private intelligence report called Early Warning (252).To return to PIO, from the outset, Bougerol used his earlier contacts with theextreme Right for PIO operations. As part of his counter-subversion work, Bougerolgave lectures to reserve officers, many of whom were recruited as PIO agents. One ofthe reserve officers' clubs at which Bougerol lectured was the Brabant ReserveOfficers' Club (BROC), which in 1975 was given the task of bolstering the patriotismof other reserve officers' clubs. BROC's members included not only AESP memberBaron Bernard de Marcken de Merken and Colonel Paul Detrembleur, who helpedset up the DSD and would later head the SDRA from 1981 to 1984 at the height ofthe strategy of tension in Belgium, but also Paul Latinus, the Belgian delle Chiaie,protegé of de Bonvoisin. A former leader of the Front de la Jeunesse financed by deBonvoisin, Latinus would later emerge as commander of the fascist parallelintelligence service Westland New Post (WNP), a key component in Belgianparapolitics in the 1980s covered in detail in a later chapter. According to Sûretésources, Latinus was recruited into PIO by Bougerol in 1977; in his testimony to theBelgian Parliament's Gladio Inquiry, Bougerol at least admitted having met Latinus(253).Bougerol's contacts with the extreme Right also extended to de Bonvoisin'sother protegé, veteran fascist putschist Emile Lecerf, editor of the Nouvel EuropeMagazine, and to future WNP militant Michel Libert, who was introduced to Bougerolby Lecerf. Bougerol and Lecerf were not only personal friends; Bougerol also gavelectures on subversion to the NEM Clubs. These close links between de Bonvoisin'sprotégés Latinus and Lecerf and Bougerol's PIO are not surprising in the light of theconsiderable support given to Bougerol by de Bonvoisin, political adviser to DefenceMinister VdB under whose jurisdiction PIO fell. De Bonvoisin had already providedPIO with much of its logistic structure and would play an ever-increasing part in therunning of PIO in the late 1970s. PIO's offices were located in the same buildingwhich housed CEPIC, the political ginger group run by VdB and de Bonvoisin; deBonvoisin's company PDG was also housed at the same address and ensured theprinting of the PIO press review Inforep. From 1976 onwards, PDG contributed morethan a million Belgian francs a year to PIO, which received total external funding ofsome 600,000 Belgian francs a month. De Bonvoisin exerted increasing influence onPIO; by early 1980 the editorial team producing PIO's Inforep consisted of EmileLecerf and Jacques Van den Bemden, drawn from the other PDG beneficiary, theneo-nazi magazine Nouvel Europe Magazine. The PIO/PDG operation was finallyblown in May 1981 when the CEPIC/MAUE/PDG/PIO building was raided as aresult of a Sûreté note about de Bonvoisin's patronage of fascist groups. It quicklybecame apparent that PIO's files had been transferred wholesale to PDG.Apart from this funding of PIO by de Bonvoisin and the links that Bougerolhad with Detrembleur and AESP member de Marcken within the reserve officersclub BROC, Bougerol also had frequent direct contacts with the leadership of theAESP and the Cercle. The first trace we find of direct links between the AESP andBougerol dates from February 1976 when Bougerol attended the IXth ChapterAssembly of the AESP together with many of the Cercle's international contacts.THE ACADEMY IN 1976On the 6th and 7th February, 1976, the AESP held its XIXth Grand DînerCharlemagne in the Hotel Métropole in Brussels, before meeting the next day in themore private setting of the Cercle des Nations club for the IXth Chapter Assembly ofthe AESP, devoted to the subject "After Helsinki" - the Helsinki Final Accord hadbeen signed in July 1975. The attendance lists of these two events give us anoverview of the Academy's contacts and of their preoccupations. Besides continuingits work on the theme of free movement of persons and ideas linked to the HelsinkiConference on Security and cooperation in Europe, the Academy was a vocaladvocate of the Doomsday message that the Third World War had already begun andwas being lost by the West, passively submitting to a war of Soviet subversioncorrupting the very pillars of Western civilization. Under the title "Are we at war?",Damman's editorial on the front page of the January 1976 issue of the AESP/MAUEjournal Europe Information which announced the Charlemagne Grand Dinner andthe AESP Chapter Assembly opened with the words:"One would have to be blind not to notice that the Third World War is in fullswing with a new weapon of extraordinary power, acting upon the spirit, theintellect and morale: subversion, slowly contaminating all sectors of societyand all regions of the world, is gaining the upper hand because we refuse toconfront it head on. All of our political parties including the Communist Partyare infiltrated by the agents of Soviet imperialism which has never renouncedits goal of world hegemony. The West is still unaware of the power of thesubversive forces infiltrating every organization under the most varieddisguises, both in Europe and America and in the countries of the ThirdWorld. The Atlantic Alliance ignores this tactical weapon following anextraordinary reasoning which has led it since the end of the last World Warto surrender on all fronts to Soviet imperialism ... Soviet imperialism has inthe Western camp a gigantic and ever-active organisation, skilfully structuredto maintain anarchy and confusion where they are needed, studied in exactdetail to confuse the mind and stoke antagonism. We have become puppets,and it is our enemies who pull the strings".This apocalyptic vision of the West slowly being strangled by the invisibleforces of Soviet subversion fits entirely with the philosophy of intelligence-backedcounter-subversion and disinformation operations such as the ISC, the MondeModerne and PIO, all three of which were represented at the 1976 XIXthCharlemagne Grand Dinner and the subsequent IXth Chapter Assembly of theAESP: the list of participants includes Crozier from the ISC, Vigneau and Leguèbefrom the Monde Moderne, and Benoît de Bonvoisin and "Major de Bougerolle" fromPIO (254). This would be the first of at least two occasions for the Cercle's countersubversionpropagandists to meet in 1976; as we will see in a subsequent chapter,the same people would meet again at the 25th CEDI Congress in December.At the February AESP gathering, the Belgian Academy team were fullyrepresented by Damman, de Merken, Jonet, Vankerkhoven and de Villegas. Alsoattending were two longstanding AESP members whom we have not yet met,Vincent Van den Bosch and Bernard Mercier. Van den Bosch was another keypartner of Damman's, serving not only as International Secretary-General of CEDIbut also as a member of the AESP Permanent Delegation, and Secretary-General ofDamman's MAUE. Mercier, an Academy member, served on the Board of theConservative ginger group CEPIC alongside Benoît de Bonvoisin and AESP membersVanden Boeynants and Vankerkhoven.Although Jean Violet was not present, most of his closest associates fromFrance were in attendance: Collet, Vallet, Father Dubois and Picard of Wilton Park.The Academy's German members, Dumont de Voitel and von Merkatz, were there,bringing along the CDU Vice-President of the German Parliament, Kai-Uwe vonHassel. As well as serving as Regional Prime Minister for Schleswig-Holstein from1954 to 1966, von Hassel had replaced the disgraced Strauss as Defence Ministerafter the 1962 Spiegel Affair, serving until 1966 when he was appointed Minister forExpellees, Refugees and War Victims in the Grand Coalition Cabinet in whichStrauss was Finance Minister. In 1969, von Hassel replaced Eugen Gerstenmaier asPresident of the German Parliament, serving until the SPD's victory in 1972, whenhe became CDU Vice-President of the Parliament, a post he filled until 1976. Theroll-call of core Academy members was brought to a close by Pons of the PEU andSanchez Bella of CEDI.However, it is the Italian connections of the AESP that are the mostfascinating. The former high-ranking P2 member Giancarlo Elia Valori attendedboth the Charlemagne Grand Dinner and the AESP Chapter Assembly; he wouldbecome a member of the AESP's organising core, the Permanent Delegation, thefollowing year. His presence is particularly interesting in the light of the allegationsconcerning P7 - two of the Academy members allegedly involved in P7, Pons andTöttösy, were also at these meetings with Valori. Valori's attendance at Academyevents from 1972 on also points to possible connections between the sniffer planescandal and P2. Most of the key members in the sniffer plane negotiations werepresent at the 1976 Grand Dîner and Chapter Assembly with Valori: de Villegas,Father Dubois and Vallet. Vallet and de Villegas would join Valori on the AESPPermanent Delegation by 1977. At the time of these February 1976 AESP events,final agreements were being reached with Elf; the contract between de Villegas'Fisalma and Elf would be signed at the end of May, saving the Cercle Pinay complexfrom financial ruin, as described in the next chapter.Valori and Lombardo already provided the AESP with high-calibre contacts toP2 and the group involved in the 1974 Sogno coup. A new face at the Februarygathering strengthened the Academy's links to Italian politics and to the Sogno coup:former Minister Giovanni Malagodi, a participant at the Bilderbergers' inauguralconference in May 1954 (255). Sogno had fought Communism during the war as acontact of the British secret service; in 1953, he was one of the founders of theItalian section of Peace and Freedom, a ferociously anti-communist propagandagroup whose Belgian section was run by the Chevalier de Roover (256). President ofthe Liberal International, Malagodi was the President of the Italian Liberal Party PLIand an influential member of the PLI's Sogno faction in 1974 when Sogno, a futuremember of P2, was insisting that a coup of "liberal" inspiration was necessary to saveItaly from Communism. The "liberal coup" that Sogno proposed was scheduled forAugust 1974 and included the capture of the Presidential Palace, the dissolution ofParliament and the nomination of a government of technocrats, but the plan wasaborted shortly beforehand.Despite the failure of their plan, the Sogno fraction continued to insist thatthe rise of Communism threatened the very basis of the Italian State. One monthafter the planned Sogno coup, in September 1974, Malagodi participated in the 7thStudy Conference of the PLI's youth group along with Manlio Brosio, a formerSecretary-General of NATO and former Italian Defence Minister, who had beenresponsible for the post-war organization of the Italian intelligence community andthe establishment of SIFAR (257). At the September conference, Brosio declared thatonly communism - and not fascism - presented an immediate danger to stability inItaly. The judicial inquiry into the Sogno coup was blocked in November 1974 by thedeath of the main witness, secret service Colonel Giuseppe Condo. Condo, aged 42,died of a "heart attack" a week before magistrates were due to question him. Sognoand one of his co-conspirators were arrested on charges of attempting a coup d'étatin 1976, but this second inquiry failed to get to the bottom of the coup plansbecause of the State secrecy imposed on documents showing foreign support forSogno's plans (258).CASH CRISIS AND THE SNIFFER PLANESIn the midst of such international networking, the Cercle Pinay went througha severe financial crisis. The main source of funding for the Cercle had been CarloPesenti, who had also financed the launch of de Villegas' sniffer plane project.However, threatened by takeovers from P2 financier Michele Sindona, Pesenti wasforced to make drastic cuts in his funding of Violet. Pesenti was able to beat backSindona's offensive with the help of Philippe de Weck, Director of UBS Zürich andadministrator of de Villegas' sniffer plane company Fisalma. The Bank of Italyinvestigated Pesenti after de Weck helped him to stave off Sindona: "the inspectorswent through the books of the banks of Pesenti, exposing the dubious means bywhich he had extricated himself from Sindona's grip" (259).This was not the first time Pesenti had been raided by Sindona; Sindona's1968 attempt to take over Pesenti's empire permanently weakened Pesenti'sfinances. Obliged to borrow money from his own three banks to buy Sindona out,Pesenti was later forced to sell off those banks one by one to settle his debts. Pesentialso shored up his indebted Italmobiliare group by substantial borrowings fromBanco Ambrosiano and its various Italian offshoots, secured by large blocks ofshares in companies controlled by Pesenti. Another of Pesenti's suspect dealingslater to be investigated was "a curious 50 billion lire loan granted to Pesenti in 1972- apparently by the IOR - and indexed to the Swiss franc. The latter's appreciationmeant that the sum eventually reimbursed was 185 billion lire. A decade after thatloan was signed, magistrates in Milan were still unsure whether the Vatican Bankhad excogitated a brilliant deal, or whether it had acted as a 'fiduciary' once more,this time for an irregular capital export by Pesenti" (260). Pesenti used the loancapital to buy shares from Roberto Calvi, head of the Banco Ambrosiano, but keptthe loan off Italmobiliare's books until 1979 when it fell due. This led someItalmobiliare shareholders to challenge the very existence of the loan, believing thatPesenti was under pressure to pay the vast sum to IOR for other unspecifiedreasons. The case wound up in court but was not resolved before Pesenti's death in1984 (261).Following Sindona's attack on Pesenti's financial empire and Pesenti'sreduction of funds to the Cercle, the Cercle went through a disastrous cash crisis,above all in the light of the ambitious scope of its operations. Violet's cassettemessage to Damman of 31st March, 1976 was so serious that, despite specificinstructions to the contrary, Damman transcribed it in full:"Considerable financial difficulties mainly due to the storm on the lira. Thesituation that has arisen has led to people cancelling their contributions,having to submit to a fait accompli.Closure of the Centre du Monde Moderne and probably of the Bulletin deParis.With these limited means, the keystone to any action is money. I will devotemyself to setting up structures of financial groups so as to essentially developthe Academy and all that revolves around it, as well as the London group [theISC], and set up Edicercle on a serious basis, and launch the Bible-prisonersoperation on that basis ... we will ensure the vital minimum for the Academywhich is a priority" (262).On the 16th April, Damman received another cassette from Violet, which thistime he only partially transcribed: "Search for backers in progress. Meeting in Parisend of May/beginning of June" (263). The timing and the mention of backers allowsus to make an almost certain connection to the negotiations taking place betweenElf, the French state oil company, and Fisalma, the sniffer plane company set up byde Villegas, represented by de Weck of UBS and assisted by Violet. Elf had beentesting the sniffer planes for some time and was now interested in acquiringexclusive rights over the invention. At the meetings with Elf, de Villegas wasaccompanied by the "inner circle" of Pinay members: not only Violet, but also Pinayhimself and Father Dubois frequently participated. The contract between Elf andFisalma was signed on 29th May, 1976, and the meeting between Valéry Giscardd'Estaing, Elf President Pierre Guillaumat, and Pinay, representing Violet, was heldon 2nd June.For exclusive rights over the invention for a period of one year, Elf undertookto make four quarterly payments of 50 million Swiss francs to Fisalma, the firstscheduled for the 15th June, the second for 15th October. The Cercle's financialsituation dramatically improved after the key discussion between Pinay and theFrench President. On 8th October, Violet sent another cassette to Damman, thistime much more optimistic about funding for the AESP: "Good perspectives for 1977.The President [Antoine Pinay] and a group of friends. Essential resources.Modifications to means". Damman replied to the good news from Violet on 13thOctober: "I was very happy to receive your cassette message guaranteeing fundingfor the Academy for 1977 ... my warmest thanks for the essential minimum you haveprovided us with, we will do the rest" (264).THE FOREIGN AFFAIRS RESEARCH INSTITUTEShortly after attending the Academy's Grand Dinner and Chapter Assembly inBrussels in February 1976, Brian Crozier would launch a new regrouping of BritishCercle friends, the Foreign Affairs Research Institute (265). The new geopoliticalinstitute brought together under one roof the disinformation assets of the ISC andtop Conservative politicians in the Thatcherite NAFF and SIF who had worked withBOSS to oppose demonstrations against sporting links with South Africa. FARIappears to have been the British-based counterpart to the Centre d'Etudes duMonde Moderne, the Cercle's Parisian pro-Pretoria outfit. As had been the case withthe Centre du Monde Moderne, it was the South Africans who footed the bill forFARI, providing £85,000 a year for several years; South Africa continued to financeFARI until at least 1981 (266). It would seem that FARI was another of the 160projects launched by the South African Department of Information in theirclandestine propaganda war to support apartheid in the 1970s. Funding for FARIwas reportedly also forthcoming from the Lockheed and General Dynamicscorporations.In terms of personalities, FARI represented a coming together of Stewart-Smith's groups (the Foreign Affairs Circle and the Foreign Affairs PublishingCompany, publisher and distributor for the UK counter-subversion lobby and SOI)with Crozier's NAFF and ISC. The President of FARI was Bilderberger Sir FredericBennett, a member of SIF and NAFF; the FARI Director was Geoffrey Stewart-Smith;the Deputy Director was Ian Greig, the Chairman of the Monday Club SubversionCommittee and probable contact of Damman's since 1973. On the Council of FARIwe find the inseparable duo of Crozier and Moss of the ISC, NAFF and Shield, whoalso brought along Air Vice-Marshal Stuart Menaul, an ISC Council member.Michael Ivens of Aims, SIF and NAFF also joined the FARI Council.The political support FARI enjoyed is illustrated by the Council membershipof four influential Tories from Thatcher's entourage. The first and most significantwas Airey Neave, Thatcher's campaign manager during the Conservative leadershipelections in 1975 and her Shadow Minister for Northern Ireland; once in office,Thatcher planned to create a new post to oversee the intelligence and securityservices which would be filled by Neave. Neave's membership of FARI was indicativeof Thatcher's close links to the counter-subversion lobby. Neave was joined on theFARI Council by his deputy as Shadow Minister for Northern Ireland, John Biggs-Davison, Vice-President of the PEU from 1965, former Chairman of the Monday Cluband a member of SIF and NAFF. Alongside Neave and Biggs-Davison, the FARICouncil also included Julian Amery, another top Tory with strong MI6 links whowould later be a member and then Chairman of the Cercle Pinay. The fourth topConservative on the FARI Council was Lord Chalfont, a member of the ExecutiveCommittee of the European Movement and allegedly "the CIA's man in the House ofLords". A final member of the FARI Council was Colonel Ronald Wareing, a formerMI6 agent in Portugal and an associate of G. K. Young's within Unison (267).FARI continued publication of Stewart-Smith's previous fortnightly bulletinEast-West Digest, distributed free to all British MPs, and cooperated with the ISC andFAPC's foreign associates, notably INTERDOC and Dr Peter Sager's Swiss SOI (268).Working in partnership with FARI, the ISC continued their campaign in favour ofSouth Africa with a total ISC budget for 1976 of over £30,000. In June 1976, PeterJanke visited Swaziland to speak at a conference organized by a South AfricanDepartment of Information front group, the Foreign Affairs Association; at theconference, "Janke of the Institute of the Study of Conflict in London stressed theimportance of South Africa's minerals to the West and dangers of the Soviet threat"(269). Grau's Swiss group, the ISP, also supported the pro-Pretoria campaign with abrochure called Südafrikas strategische Bedeutung für die Rohstoffversorgung desWestens (South Africa's Strategic Significance for the West's Supply of Commodities)which stated: "The cutting-off of contacts between South Africa and theindustrialized countries of the West as the result of a Soviet Navy blockade or as aresult of the fall of the current South African government and its replacement by aCommunist or Communist-influenced government would leave the West entirelydefenceless" (270). July 1976 saw the publication of a Conflict Study by Janke,Southern Africa: New Horizons. At the same time, FARI prepared an edited version ofthe conference speeches for distribution to "persons of influence". The ISC followedthis in November with another Conflict Study, Soviet Strategic Penetration of Africa byDavid Rees. A further project to support South Africa was The Angolan File, a 1976South African television "documentary" which attacked the Americans for pulling outof Angola. The programme, broadcast on South African television, had beenproduced by the South African Directorate of Military Intelligence (DMI), who hadcommissioned Crozier of ISC/FARI to write the script (271).Besides its defence of apartheid, FARI was also active in domestic politics inthe UK, one of the major propaganda themes being the laxity of the Labourgovernment in dealing with a "Soviet-dominated" IRA. On three occasions betweenAugust and September 1976, the two Conservative spokesmen for Northern Ireland,Neave and Biggs-Davison, both FARI Council members, used IRD disinformation toattack the "failure" of the Labour government to combat the "Czech and Cubanagents stoking revolution in Northern Ireland". The source of this disinformation wasColin Wallace of the Information Policy Unit in Northern Ireland. In 1974-75, Infpolwas being pressured by MI5, rival to MI6 for control of the province, to go beyondblack propaganda against the IRA and to turn its disinformation capability to thethemes of KGB penetration of the Labour Party and Soviet manipulation of the IRA.As mentioned above, in 1974 Wallace was tasked by MI5 to producedefamatory documents for press release on the basis of smears and analyses ofpolitical, sexual and financial vulnerabilities of several dozen Westminster MPs.When Wallace refused to participate in this operation codenamed Clockwork Orange2 without guarantees of ministerial approval, MI5 arranged for his removal from theprovince and his dismissal from the Civil Service, a fate that befell other actors in thesecret war who would not toe the MI5 line. With a broken career behind him,Wallace did not refuse when in 1976 Neave, Shadow Minister for Northern Ireland,proposed that Wallace work for him as a consultant. Part of Wallace's work consistedin providing the Neave-Biggs-Davison team with the information that Wallace hadcollated on Soviet subversion in Northern Ireland. Wallace has given the Press aletter addressed to him from Neave, written in August 1976, in which Neave askedspecifically for a report that Wallace had prepared for Infpol, Ulster - a State ofSubversion. This document of Wallace's was based on a unattributable IRD Pressbriefing called Soviets Increase Control Over British Communists. Neave then recycledthe report's main allegations of Soviet subversion in Northern Ireland and KGBpenetration of the Parliamentary Labour Party in a speech given in August. A fewdays later, FARI published a brochure written by Neave's deputy Biggs-Davisonentitled The strategic implications for the West of the international links of the IRA inIreland. The brochure was also based on the unattributable IRD briefing and madethe same references to the alleged laxity of the Labour government in dealing withSoviet subversion in Northern Ireland. Neave would repeat the allegations in asecond speech on 11th September, and the same theme of Soviet manipulation ofthe IRA would be featured in a Conservative Party Position Paper on NorthernIreland published later the same month (272).THE MADRID MEETINGThree months later, in December 1976, CEDI held its 25th InternationalCongress in Madrid, a second international gathering of Cercle contacts after theFebruary Chapter Assembly of the AESP described above. The Madrid meetingbrought together most of the major characters we have met so far. Presiding over theCongress was Archduke Otto von Habsburg, assisted by two familiar faces: AlfredoSanchez Bella and Hans-Joachim von Merkatz. The conference participants camefrom all over the world, showing the kind of international outreach CEDI and theCercle enjoyed; besides more than one hundred Spanish delegates, some 120 foreignguests from Europe, America and South Africa gathered in Madrid. Of the nationalcampaigns listed above, the CEDI Congress brought together the Cercle, theAESP/MAUE and PIO from Belgium, Le Monde Moderne from France, the ISC, Shieldand FARI from Britain, the WISC from the US, one of the Portuguese financialbackers of Spinola and the Aginter Press, election candidates from Spain andPortugal supported by the Cercle, and senior South African diplomats - a truereunion of the international Right and their friends with intelligence links.From Belgium came CEDI's Secretary-General Vincent van den Bosch and hiscolleagues within the core of AESP/MAUE organizers: Florimond Damman, AldoMungo – the later whistle-blower, Paul Vankerkhoven and Jacques Jonet. One newface from Belgium was Jean-Paul R. Preumont, Chairman of the Belgian Board of theEuropean Movement, who would join the MAUE Board by 1979, completing theBelgian merger of the EM and the PEU.Another significant figure attending a CEDI Congress for the first time -according to the documents at our disposal - was Baron Benoît de Bonvoisin, who,as at the February AESP Chapter Assembly, was accompanied by Major Bougerol,described in the participants' list as Head of the Public Information Office of theArmy General Staff. At this time of course, PIO was in full swing; Bougerol had justcompleted his European tour, visiting AESP contacts and gathering experience incounter-subversion for use in PIO's Belgian operations. Bougerol's visit to Madridwas sensitive - in his 1978 letter to Bougerol warning him of the growing hostility inofficial circles to PIO's wide-ranging missions, Commissioner Fagnart of the Belgianmilitary security service specifically mentioned the dangers of a leak concerning fourdubious operations: the "Saoud affair" and Bougerol's visits to Formosa, the UK andSpain. Bougerol came to the Madrid Congress in the company of CEPIC SenatorAngèle Verdin and CEPIC Board member Bernard Mercier; the latter had alsoattended the February Chapter Assembly. Along with fellow CEPIC members deBonvoisin and Vankerkhoven, Mercier would also be implicated in the funding of thefascist NEM Clubs and the Front de la Jeunesse in the 1980s. Before arriving inMadrid, Bougerol, Mercier and Verdin had stopped off to pay their respects at thegrave of the recently-deceased Caudillo Franco; Mercier wore a black shirt for theoccasion.A final important member of the Belgian delegation was Ernest Töttösy, theHungarian WACL leader who, as we will see later, would be accused of being amember of P7, a covert CIA funding channel for Gelli's P2 lodge. Also present at theCEDI Congress was another alleged member of P7, the PEU International Secretary-General, Vittorio Pons from Lausanne. Pons was already increasing contact with theISC at this stage: in September 1977, the ISC would publish a Conflict Study writtenby Pons, The Long-term Strategy of Italy's Communists.Ten Britons attended the CEDI Congress, four of whom were members of theCercle Pinay itself. The first three were the key FARI Board members Crozier, Mossand Amery, who brought along his former colleague in SOE's Albanian operations,Lord St Oswald (273). FARI had cause for celebration: the counter-subversion lobby'scampaign against Harold Wilson had finally borne fruit in mid-March that year,when Wilson tendered his resignation and was succeeded by James Callaghan.The CEDI Congress also provided an opportunity for the veterandisinformation team of Crozier and Moss to advise Bougerol and de Bonvoisin on thePIO operation. Bearing in mind the ISC's collaboration with the AESP over the lastfive years, and in particular the meeting earlier in 1976 between the deBonvoisin/Bougerol team and Crozier at the February AESP Chapter Assembly, itseems probable that Bougerol had looked up Crozier and Moss during his visit to theUK later the same year before the CEDI Congress in December. In the light ofcontacts between Crozier and Bougerol, Fagnart's 1978 note of warning to Bougerolabout the consequences of a leak about "the affair concerning the UK" is intriguing -if Bougerol did visit Crozier and Moss in the UK in 1976, what might they have beenup to to arouse Fagnart's concern? Whatever the truth about possible FARI/PIOcollaboration, Moss could reminisce with de Bonvoisin and Bougerol about acommon friend, Arnaud de Borchgrave, who had brought Bougerol and de Bonvoisintogether some years earlier and who by 1976 was a prized PIO contact on the staff ofNewsweek. Bougerol was no doubt keen to add Moss to his PIO Press list; as editorof the Economist Foreign Report, Moss would be a powerful relay for PIO's output.Apart from Crozier, Moss and Amery, the fourth British Cercle member toattend the CEDI Congress was banker Sir Peter Tennant who, as Crozier records,would share the chairmanship of Cercle meetings with himself, Amery and Pesenti(274). Tennant was one of the earliest members of SOE, recruited in 1940 by SirCharles Hambro, a later head of SOE in 1942-43. Tennant would gain experience ofpropaganda broadcasts to the German armed forces during the war before being sentas an Information Counsellor to the British Embassy in Paris from 1945 to 1950,where he may have had contacts with Antoine Pinay, soon to become FrenchPremier. Tennant would then serve as Deputy Commandant of the British sector ofBerlin from 1950 to 1952 before occupying various senior posts in the Federationand later Confederation of British Industry, acting as Director-General of the BritishNational Export Council from 1965 to 1971. At the time of the CEDI Congress,Tennant was President of the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry and alongstanding adviser to Barclays’ bank (275).Besides Amery, two other Monday Club members, both Conservative MPs andformer ministers, attended the CEDI Congress. The first was Sir Peter Agnew,Conservative MP between 1931-1950 and again between 1955-1966. Agnew had saton CEDI's Steering Committee since at least 1972; this CEDI Congress would be hislast as CEDI International President, a post he had filled since 1974. The secondMonday Clubber was CEDI Vice-President Sir John Rodgers, Conservative MP from1950 to 1979, who in 1970 had served with Biggs-Davison and Young on the SIFNational Executive. Both Agnew and Rodgers would join Biggs-Davison as AESP LifeMembers by 1977.From France came the Cercle core: Antoine Pinay himself, accompanied byViolet, Vallet and Father Dubois. Also attending was René-Louis Picard, who we havemet as President of the International Society of Wilton Park. A Swiss section ofWilton Park had been set up earlier in 1976 and an Italian branch would be foundedthe following year. In 1978, Picard would join with three of the other 1976 CEDICongress participants - Violet, Sanchez Bella and Jacques Jonet - to set up CLEW,the European Liaison Committee of Associations and Friends of Wilton Park.The editorial team of the Monde Moderne, Jean Vigneau and JacquesLeguèbe, were also present at the 1976 CEDI Congress, giving the South Africanbackedpropaganda outfit another opportunity that year to confer with their Britishsister organization FARI, represented by the three FARI Board members Crozier,Moss and Amery. As we have seen, the Monde Moderne team had already metCrozier earlier at the beginning of 1976 at the AESP's Charlemagne Grand Dinnerand Chapter Assembly when the PIO duo of de Bonvoisin and Bougerol were also inattendance.At the December Congress, not only could the Monde Moderne team and theFARI group compare notes, they could also talk directly to their South Africanpaymasters: the most prominent diplomatic representatives at the CEDI Congresswere none other than the South African Secretary of Foreign Affairs Brand Fourie,and South African Ambassador to France Mr. Hating, who had taken over Cercle -Pretoria coordination after the departure of Mr. Burger, his predecessor.The Cercle's representation would, of course, not have been complete withoutsome members from Germany. We have already noted the presence of Otto vonHabsburg and Hans-Joachim von Merkatz as Chairmen of the Congress; alsoattending was Strauss's right-hand man in the Cercle, Count Hans Huyn. The 1976Congress therefore again brought together the Cercle's 1980s triumvirate - Violet,Crozier and Huyn.Another future "leading German member of the Cercle" at the 1976 CEDICongress was Franz Josef Bach. A qualified engineer, Bach later studied politicalscience at the University of Virginia in 1949 before attending the German DiplomaticService school in 1950-51, being posted to Sydney from 1951 to 1954 and toWashington from 1954 to 1957. After returning to Germany, he would fill the postsof Head of Foreign Office Affairs in the Chancellor's Office in 1957 and ministerialadviser in 1958 before running Adenauer's private office from 1959 to 1961.Returning to foreign duty, Bach would serve as General Consul in Hong Kong until1964 when he was posted to Teheran as German Ambassador until 1968. Between1969 and 1972, Bach then represented Aachen – Charlemagne's city - as a CDU MPin the German Parliament. In 1975, Bach would be interviewed by Senator Church'scommittee investigating bribes paid by aviation manufacturer Northrop. By the late1970s, Bach would work closely with Crozier in taking over the practicalorganization of Cercle meetings from Jean Violet (276).Three other Germans of note attended the 1976 CEDI Congress: Dr. RichardJaeger, Vice-President of the German Parliament, Dr. Fritz Pirkl, Chairman of theCSU's Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung from its creation in 1967 until his death in 1993, andMajor-General Heinz Hückelheim from Cologne. Hückelheim had an interestingtie-in to the Belgian Gladio network; as a colonel of the German military securityservice, the Militärischer Abschirmdienst MAD, in the 1950s, Hückelheim hadbeen the German partner of André Moyen in his clandestine campaigns againstCommunism (277).The Italian participants at the CEDI Congress were characterized by theirlinks to the world of Catholic high finance. One Italian Congress participant we'vealready met before was Carlo Pesenti of Italcementi and Italmobiliare, financer of theCercle, the AESP and the sniffer plane project. Along with Pesenti at the CEDICongress was another Catholic financier, Orazio Bagnasco. Both Pesenti andBagnasco would later be central figures in the Banco Ambrosiano just before itscollapse in 1982.Amongst the hundred or so participants from Spain were three Cerclecontacts. CEDI founder Alfredo Sanchez-Bella was one of the co-chairs for theCongress; also attending was one of the Cercle's candidates in the Spanish elections,Cruz Martinez Esteruelas, President of the Union Democratica del Pueblo Espanolwithin Fraga Iribarne's Alianza Popular. The CEDI Congress was an opportunity forMartinez Esteruelas to meet Franz Josef Strauss's foreign policy representative,Hans Huyn; over the next twelve months, Strauss would channel some DM 100,000to Martinez Esteruelas for his election campaigns. Besides this German-Spanishaxis, the French Monde Moderne team of Vigneau and Leguèbe also met an oldfriend, Colonel Juan Manuel Sancho Sofranis, a Spanish military representative atthe 1974 Paris launch of the Centre d'Etudes du Monde Moderne.Another Cercle election candidate - this time Portuguese - attending the CEDICongress was Kaulza de Arriaga, former Commander-in-Chief of Portuguese Forcesin Mozambique, who had been arrested eighteen months earlier for his involvementin the coup planned for March 1975. Arriaga would also benefit from considerablelargesse channelled through Strauss over the coming years. During his spell inMozambique, Arriaga had liaised closely with millionaire Jorge Jardim, anotherPortuguese participant at this 1976 CEDI Congress.Jardim, "former king of the Portuguese colonists", was the secret backer andleader of the Uniao Nacional Africana de Rombezia (UNAR), a splinter group fromFRELIMO whose goal was to set up a buffer state between Tanzania and Zambese toblock FRELIMO's advance - Jardim would be closely linked to the murder ofFRELIMO leader Walter Mondlane. Jardim had set up "counter-gangs" inMozambique; together with leading counter-insurgency expert Captain AlpoimCalvao, later one of the commanders of the Aginter Press/Spinola underground armyELP, Jardim had created the Flechas, black mercenaries under white leadership whooperated from Jardim's estates on the Mozambique/Malawi border. Besides hisAginter Press/ELP contacts, Jardim was also active on an international level tosupport Spinola's plans for a coup, attending the SDECE's Sheraton Hotelconference for the putschists in September 1975. After Machel's victory inMozambique, Jardim fled to Gabon and became a major source of finance forRENAMO, the Mozambiquan counter-revolutionary guerrilla force set up by theRhodesian Central Intelligence Organisation (278).The Cercle's transatlantic contacts were also represented at the CEDICongress. Eighteen months earlier, the ISC had set up their American offshoot, theWashington ISC; Adolph W. Schmidt, a member of the US Committee of the ISC,would attend the 1976 CEDI Congress. Schmidt would go on to serve on theAdvisory Council of the NSIC at least until 1984. A second American participant ofnote was Crosby Kelly, the American industrialist originally intended as a source ofseed capital for the sniffer plane project. A third American participant was CharlesT. Mayer of the Foreign Policy Discussion Group, a group about which little isknown. The FPDG must however have continued contact with the Cercle complex, asMayer would later be invited to attend a 1989 Cercle meeting with Pinay, Huyn,Crozier and Amery, all present at the 1976 CEDI Congress.A final participant of note at the CEDI Congress was Alfons Dalma, Directorof News and Information for Austrian radio and television, who had representedAustria on CEDI's International Council since at least 1972. Dalma may havediscussed the Washington ISC with Schmidt at the CEDI Congress. Dalma had mettwo WISC Committee members one month after WISC's foundation in March 1975,when he attended the April 1975 Bilderberg conference in Cesme, Turkey, withGeorge Ball and Zbigniew Brzezinski of WISC, Sir Frederic Bennett of NAFF andfuture President of FARI, and two Cercle beneficiaries, Franz Josef Strauss andMargaret Thatcher.This CEDI Congress allows us to draw certain conclusions about the Cercle'soperations. In 1976, there would be two opportunities for the main Cerclepropagandists to meet; the ISC/FARI team, the Monde Moderne staff and the PIOduo of de Bonvoisin and Bougerol would all meet at both the AESP ChapterAssembly in February and the CEDI Congress in December at a critical time for theirrespective operations. Without being able to deduce any indication of mutualassistance, these meetings do indicate the close communication between thenational groups that made up the Cercle complex. The few internal documents fromthe ISC, the AESP, the ISP and CEDI that are available can only afford a glimpse oftheir international networking. Despite the lack of documents from other years,there can be no doubt that this coalition of top right-wing politicians and covertoperators held meetings several times a year throughout the 1970s. This glimpse in1976 and another in 1979-80 may be fragmentary, but they certainly show only thetip of the iceberg.1977 -1980ELECTION FEVERA SHIELD FOR THE IRON LADYThe late 1970s would be a period of intense activity for the London end of theCercle complex. During this period, Crozier and his associates concentrated on twomain projects: setting up Shield, the advisory group on subversion which personallycounselled Margaret Thatcher, and the creation of an international privateintelligence service which came to be known as the Sixth International or 6I (sixeye).As we have seen, Shield was created in March 1976 by the inner core of NAFFmembers: Crozier, Moss, McWhirter, Gouriet and Lord De L'Isle, all present at theMarch 1976 dinner with Margaret Thatcher. Crozier records: "Thereafter we hadmany meetings, either at the Thatchers' London home .. or in her room in the House[of Commons]. Later they continued, usually at Chequers, but sometimes atDowning Street. Mostly we met alone. In the early days, however, I was oftenaccompanied by a well-known (some would say notorious) ex-senior man in Britain'sSecret Intelligence Service [MI6], Nicholas Elliott" (279). In MI6 Counter-Intelligencewith postings to Berne, Istanbul, London and Beirut, it was Elliott who hadconfronted Philby in Beirut in 1963, precipitating his flight to the Soviet Union (280).As described in later chapters, Elliott would go on to play a key rôle not only inShield, but also in the Cercle's international private intelligence service, 6I, thatCrozier would create in 1977.As for Shield's structure, Crozier records that Shield's providers were made upof Crozier, former MI6 officers Elliott and Stephen Hastings and Harry Sporborg, aNorwegian-born former Deputy Head of the wartime Special Operations Executivethen working for Hambro's Bank, the third SOE veteran within the Cercle togetherwith Tennant and Amery. "With the resources of the Institute for the Study ofConflict at our disposal, we produced some twenty papers on various aspects ofsubversion. The researchers were Peter Shipley and Douglas Eden. The papers weremade available immediately to Margaret Thatcher and, on request, to other membersof the committee on the 'receiving' side. Apart from Mrs Thatcher, there were three ofthem, all members of her shadow cabinet: Lord Carrington, William (later Lord)Whitelaw, and Sir Keith Joseph [responsible for foreign, domestic and economicaffairs]" (281). Thatcher's Shadow Minister for Northern Ireland – and intendedintelligence supremo - Airey Neave and his deputy John Biggs-Davison were ofcourse other shadow cabinet members intimately linked to Shield."The work of the Shield committee fell into two broad categories. One wasstrategic: it concerned the state of Britain's existing counter-subversion machinery,proposals for fundamental change, and contingency planning for a major crisis - awidespread paralysis caused by political strikes and riots ... The other category wastactical: to provide short, factual and accurate research papers on the Communistconnections of Labour MPs and trades unionists in the increasingly criticalindustrial scene, especially in late 1978 and early 1979" (282).As regards the latter category for Shield actions, the initiator of Shield, formerMI6 officer and Tory MP Stephen Hastings also gave a parliamentary platform for thecounter-subversion lobby's charges concerning Labour MPs' Communistconnections. In 1977, Hastings relaunched the Frolik allegations that Labour MPshad spied for the Czech intelligence service. In 1976, veteran espionage journalistand MI5 friend Chapman Pincher had sent Hastings tape recordings of interviewswith Frolik who reiterated his charges. This contact between Pincher and Hastingswas not surprising; Pincher had been the guest speaker at a NAFF seminar onsubversion organized in August 1975 before NAFF's formal creation. In December1977, under Parliamentary privilege, Hastings named the Labour MPs whom Frolikaccused of having worked for the Czech intelligence service; in January 1978,Hastings stepped up the pressure by sending to Prime Minister Callaghan a copy ofa letter from Frolik to Josef Josten (a member of NAFF like Hastings), in which Froliksaid he was afraid to visit Britain because the Czech intelligence service had Britishfriends in high places (283).As for the first category for Shield actions, "Shield's first move was tocommission an extensive report on the current state of subversion and on theexisting official agencies that were supposed to handle the problem. The report,which ran to about 100 pages, was drafted by a former senior member of the SecretIntelligence Service: an old and trusted friend of Stephen Hastings and myself. Afterrevisions by Stephen, Nicholas and me, the final draft was ready in May 1977" (284).The most likely candidate for this anonymous author is NAFF National Councilmember G. K. Young, former Deputy Director of MI6. Having failed to take over theMonday Club in 1973, Young had launched the private army Unison in 1974 withRoss McWhirter and two former MI6 colleagues, Anthony Cavendish and ColonelRonald Wareing, the latter joining the FARI Council with Crozier, Moss et al in 1976.The direct line to Mrs Thatcher that Shield provided allowed disgruntledformer MI5 or MI6 officers to condemn what they saw as the previous fatalweakening of Britain's counter-subversion effort. IRD had been cut back in the late1960s; the ISC would step into the breach following its creation in 1969-70. Thecompletion in May 1977 of this first Shield report on the need for a reorganizationand reinforcement of the official counter-subversion effort coincided with thedecision of Labour Foreign Secretary David Owen finally to close down IRD.According to Crozier, this was at least in part motivated by the close links betweenIRD and the ISC which had hit the headlines a year previously. In the eyes of thecounter-subversion lobby, the decision smacked of treachery: "Thus, the LabourGovernment had destroyed the only active instrument of counter-subversion in theUnited Kingdom ... as a sop to the Left. The KGB had won, possibly when it leastexpected victory" (285).The radical tone of Shield's report can be judged from Crozier's analysis of thechallenge Shield sought to combat: "The problem was subversion: the deliberateundermining of the State and society. Subversion is an insidious man-made disease,a creeping paralysis in which the State's defensive organs are invaded andneutralized, until they cease to function: the political equivalent to AIDS. In Britain,as in other affected countries, the ultimate aim was to turn the country into a'people's democracy' on the East European model. ... In Britain in particular theproblem had become more threatening. The main reason was simply that the tradesunions and the Labour Party had been largely taken over by the subversive Left.Many other areas of life were affected: the schools and universities, the media, theChurches" (286). Crozier further states that Shield's actions were "a question ofsurvival in a nation in which the dominant rôle, increasingly, was played by extremeLeft Labour MPs and constituency managers and by trades unions whose long-termgoal ... was to transform Britain into another East Germany or Czechoslovakia"(287). The Shield report concluded that MI6 was "basically in good shape" but thatMI5 was not, due to its charter restricting surveillance (officially) to threats of "theoverthrow of the government by unlawful means". "In that initial paper, therefore, wehad proposed an urgent redefinition of the terms of reference of MI5, along withfresh directives to both the Services enabling them not merely to report onsubversion, but to go over to the counter-offensive. For MI6, too, the counteroffensiveangle was emphasized" (288).Whilst work progressed on the review of Britain's counter-subversion effort,Shield also turned its attention to reporting on current subversive threats. "BetweenMay 1977 and July 1979, Shield produced no fewer than fifteen strategic papers,recommending counter-action to meet the subversive challenge and defeat it" (289)."One, dated April 1978, gave details of joint Labour-Communist activity ... inNovember of that year, we identified forty-eight Labour Party prospectiveparliamentary candidates with extreme Left views and connections ... on 15 January[1979], a Shield paper traced the origin of the [lorry drivers'] strike to Alex Kitson,General Secretary of the Scottish Commercial Motormen's Union ... well known forhis pro-Soviet sympathies ... on 17 January, a further paper analysed the potentialconsequences, which included the possible use of troops for essential services ... In afurther paper, on 29 January, Shield dwelt on the extremist influences within theNational Union of Public Employees ... In a longer paper dated 12 February 1979,Shield looked at the strike policy of the Communist Party ... In another paper, dated26 February 1979, we gave details of various Labour groups which had beencampaigning for the overthrow of the Shah of Iran" (290).Crozier also felt that Thatcher's confidence needed strengthening so as to"cultivate and consolidate a public image of clear-headedness and resolution. To thisend, at one of our private Flood Street meetings, I handed her a programme of'Psychological Action' ... a practical technique originally formalized by my closeFrench friend, Maître Jean Violet ... What I had done was to borrow Violet's tried andtested principles, and adapt them to current British needs". This programme of'Psychological Action' focused on identifying people's needs and fears, and on thatbasis developing questions to be inserted into political speeches. Crozier notes that"many, though not all, of the points made surfaced in her speeches and those of herfollowers in the run-up to the next elections" (291).As the industrial action of the "winter of discontent" under Wilson's successorJames Callaghan intensified, Shield revised their initial paper on the Britishcounter-subversion effort and in a "Mechanism Paper" dated May 1978 proposed thecreation of a "Counter-Subversion Executive" "not only to counter anti-Britishsubversive activity both in the United Kingdom and in other parts of the world, byclandestine means both offensive and defensive, but also actively to conduct aclandestine offensive against Soviet power" (292). Several weeks later, Crozier,Elliott, Hastings and Sporborg met with Thatcher, Whitelaw, Joseph and Carringtonto discuss the Counter-Subversion Executive. Difficulties arose as to theadministrative accountability of the proposed CSE; Lord Carrington objected toCrozier's suggestion of housing it within the Foreign Office and to Thatcher'ssuggestion of accommodating it within the Cabinet Office or in Downing Street.Sporborg then wrote to Hastings, Crozier and Elliott to suggest that the CSE shouldbe a secret appendage of MI6, thus ensuring the necessary confidentiality for theproposed new body.Shield's view of the necessity for such a body was reiterated in a Shieldstrategic paper written in June 1979 "by a senior officer of MI5 who had just retired".The former MI5 man described MI5 as "an intellectually weakened organization nolonger prepared to take Marxist-Leninist influences seriously. Too much time andresources were devoted to the trailing of foreign spies ... and too little to domesticsubversion" (293). The perspectives for the creation of the proposed CSE as a remedyto such perceived failings of MI5 had been given a boost by Thatcher's electionvictory in May 1979, but ultimately Lord Carrington's hostility to the countersubversionlobby could not be overcome, and in a July 1979 meeting at Chequerswith the new Prime Minister, the Shield team was informed that Shield's efforts wereno longer necessary and that the CSE would not be created. Although the rejectionof the CSE was a blow to the Shield group, it was not fatal: since early 1977, Crozierhad been running a private international secret service called the Sixth Internationalor 6I; as Crozier records, "the London end of the 6I simply took over Shield's work."PRIVATE SPY – SIX EYEThe initiative for formalizing Cercle contacts into a private secret service camein early 1977, a year or so into Shield's operations. As Crozier records: "Somethingbigger than Shield was needed to deal with the wider threat from the Soviet Unionand its worldwide subversive network" (294). At the time, the Western countersubversioneffort was in disarray: the IRD would be formally closed down in April-May 1977, and the American intelligence community was still reeling from theexposure of the Watergate scandal and the four hundred posts shed by the CIA afterthe appointment of Admiral Stansfield Turner. Crozier voiced the counter-subversionlobby's point of view in saying: "This catastrophic decision completed the selfemasculationof American intelligence" (295)."The question was whether something could be done in the private sector -not only in Britain, but in the United States and other countries of the WesternAlliance. A few of us had been exchanging views, and decided that action was indeedpossible. I took the initiative by convening a very small and very secret meeting inLondon. We met in the luxurious executive suite of a leading City of London bank onthe morning of Sunday 13 February 1977. Our host, a leading figure in the bank,took the chair. Three of us were British, four were American, with one German. Illhealth prevented a French associate from joining us; Jean Violet was with us inspirit" (296).Crozier does not identify the host of the first 6I meeting, although one likelycandidate is SOE veteran Sir Peter Tennant of Barclays', the co-Chairman of theCercle who, only two months before this first 6I meeting, had attended the December1976 CEDI Congress in Madrid alongside Crozier, Moss and Amery from Britain,Pinay, Violet and Vallet from France, Damman and Vankerkhoven of the AESP, deBonvoisin and Bougerol of PIO, Vigneau and Leguèbe from Le Monde Moderne andAdolph W. Schmidt from the US Committee for the ISC. Other possible hosts for the6I could be either Harry Sporborg of Hambro's Bank or G. K. Young of investmentbankers Kleinwort Benson. Crozier goes on to identify the third Briton as NicholasElliott, but conceals the German's identity with the following words: "The Germanwas a very active member of the Bundestag, whose career had started in diplomacy.He had a very wide understanding of Soviet strategy, on which he wrote several firstratebooks" - all of which is a perfect fit for Count Hans Huyn, who had also attendedthe 1976 CEDI Congress.As for the Americans, the most notable participant at the 6I meeting wasGeneral Vernon 'Dick' Walters, who served as Deputy Director of CentralIntelligence (under William Colby, himself a Cercle guest) from 1972 to 1976, retiringshortly before this first 6I meeting. Fluent in six European languages as a result ofhis childhood in the UK and France, Walters would become a veteran coupmasterinvolved in most of the CIA’s dirtiest operations – Iran, Italy, Vietnam, Chile, Angola,Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador and Fiji, often working with other Cerclecontacts. As American Military Attaché in Teheran, Walters had worked with KermitRoosevelt and G. K. Young in the 1953 Operation Ajax to overthrow Iranian PrimeMinister Mossadegh. From 1967 to 1972, when the Cercle and AESP were being setup, Walters was Military Attaché in Paris responsible for the Benelux region.The three remaining American participants at the 1977 founding meeting ofthe 6I were "two able and diligent Congressional staffers, and the Viennese bornrepresentative of a big Belgian company". Although no definite identification of thistrio has yet been possible, one should note the considerable assistance provided toCrozier over the previous two years by Robert Fearey's Senate Internal Security Sub-Committee which had invited Crozier to testify at terrorism hearings in May 1975. InMarch 1976, Fearey then chaired a major international conference on terrorismwhose speakers included Crozier, Moss, Wilkinson and Horchem from Germany.Three contenders for the two anonymous US Congressional staffers emergefrom Crozier's later work in the early 1990s within the International FreedomFederation, which included Huyn, Horchem and several other 6I members, describedbelow. According to his IFF biography, "Herbert Romerstein investigated Sovietespionage and influence operations for eighteen years as a professional staff memberof the US House of Representatives' Committee on Internal Security and thePermanent Select Committee on Intelligence. From 1983 until 1989 he was a seniorpolicy adviser for the United States Information Agency, where he was Director to theOffice to Counter Soviet Active Measures and Disinformation". In his 1993 memoirs,Crozier recalls that Romerstein was "one of the leading American official specialistson the Soviet intelligence system, whom I have known for many years".The IFF would also include two other American contacts of Crozier's withCongressional careers. From 1967 to 1976, Sven Kraemer served as an armscontrol expert on the National Security Council under Johnson, Nixon and Ford; wethen lose sight of him until 1979 by which time he "held senior staff positions in theCongressional branch of government, working with Senator John Tower (R-Tex) andthe Republican Policy Committee of the US Senate (1979-80)". He would return tothe NSC in 1981, serving as Reagan's Director of Arms Control until 1987, duringwhich period he would be one of Crozier's regular contacts in the White House; healso served as Program Director of Barnett’s NSIC. If Kraemer started hisCongressional career before 1979, he may the second of the 6I's Congressionalstaffers. Alternatively, there is David Holliday, who would switch in 1976 from beingCapitol Correspondent of KWTV Channel 9 (CBS) to serving as "AdministrativeAssistant to Governor David L. Boren of Oklahoma and between 1978 to 1985 asChief Assistant for Legislative Affairs to Senator Boren. Between 1985 and 1987, Mr.Holliday served as a Professional Staff Member of the US Senate Select Committeeon Intelligence ... Between 1987 and 1991, Mr. Holliday was the Special Assistant tothe Chairman and Official Spokesman of the US Senate Select Committee onIntelligence" . Holliday himself wrote: "During the years that I spent with the SenateIntelligence Committee, the area that I was primarily responsible for was covertaction. I got very much involved with that subject" (297).At the inaugural 6I meeting, Crozier proposed to Elliott, Huyn, Walters andthe other participants to create "a Private Sector Operational Intelligence agency,beholden to no government, but at the disposal of allied or friendly governments forcertain tasks which, for one reason or another, they were no longer able to tackle. Imust make it clear that 'these tasks did not include any acts of armed force orphysical coercion' " (298).The tasks of the 6I would rather be in the field of intelligence-gathering,psychological warfare and covert funding; Crozier summarizes the tasks of the 6I asfollows: "to provide reliable intelligence in areas which governments were barredfrom investigating, either through recent legislation (as in the US) or becausepolitical circumstances made such inquiries difficult or potentially embarrassing; toconduct secret counter-subversion operations in any country in which such actionswere deemed feasible" (299). The future rôle of the 6I in circumventing domesticrestrictions on intelligence operations and in coordinating private sector countersubversionefforts is stressed by Crozier: "We planned both to initiate secretoperations in our various countries, and to coordinate the existing overt actions ofthe many private groups involved in the resistance to Soviet propaganda and Activemeasures ... Unlike existing agencies, we would not be hampered by prohibitions onfunctioning in our own or Allied countries" (300).The name of the Sixth International or "six-eye" (following the five Communistor Trotskyist internationals) was suggested some months later by "a distinguishedArgentine associate of ours, a former Justice Minister (and anti-Peronist) namedJacques Perriaux" (301). Elliott and Crozier undertook to find the funding necessaryfor the 6I's operations from industrial sponsors; an initial estimate of $5 million ayear was suggested, although as Crozier notes: "our initial estimate of financialneeds was too high: not for the requirements, but for the realistic limits of generosityon the part of the necessarily small number of sources we approached" (302). "At theheight of the 6I's activities in the mid-1980s, we were spending around $1 million ayear" (303).As for the 6I's members, Crozier records that its network of agents andinformants grew swiftly. "The main requirement for recruitment was "access". Weneeded well-placed men and women, with access to leaders, to intelligence andsecurity services, to selected politicians, to editors of potentially useful publications.All that was needed was for those selected from the contacts each had built upbefore and after the birth of the 6I, to be conscious of our existence and our goals. ...In addition to our own network, we gained access to a number of existing networks,both private and official. In Germany, we had three prime sources. One was the exdiplomatturned politician, Count Hans Huyn, a close friend of the Bavarian leaderFranz Josef Strauss ... Another was the ebullient, ever-cheerful Hans Josef 'Jupp'Horchem ... The third source was one of the senior intelligence officials who hadresigned in disgust when Chancellor Brandt emasculated the former Gehlen office(304). I shall call him Hans von Machtenberg. With him, into early retirement, hetook a substantial network of agents, whose identities he had refused to disclose tohis new political masters. Hans lived near Pullach, in Bavaria, headquarters of theBND. There, with the approval and backing of Strauss, he secured financial backingto continue his work, in the private sector ... I invited him to join our directingcommittee (which we called our 'Politburo'). Thereafter, he received our bulletin anda selection of our secret reports. In return, I received his regular intelligence reportsin German, with full discretion to use them, unattributably" (305).Hans Christoph Schenk Freiherr von Stauffenberg had been anInformation Evaluator with the BND before leaving to set up a private intelligenceservice within Strauss's CSU party. Von Stauffenberg's network liaised closely withformer BND special operative Hans Langemann, head of the State ProtectionDepartment within Strauss's Bavarian Interior Ministry, and as such the top linkman for the security and intelligence services. The technical adviser for vonStauffenberg's secret service was Langemann's former boss in the Strategic Serviceof the BND, retired Brigadier-General Wolfgang Langkau, who had resigned in 1968when Wessel abolished the Strategic Service due to Langkau's overt right-wingsympathies. Much of von Stauffenberg's information came from Langemann, whoreceived over DM 300,000 from von Stauffenberg between 1977 and 1982.Langemann in turn used an intelligence slush fund, "Positive Protection of theConstitution", to finance a registered charity, the Arbeitskreis für das Studiuminternationaler Fragen (Working Group for the Study of International Issues) whichsupported von Stauffenberg's group. 100 copies of each von Stauffenberg report wereprinted: recipients included Strauss and Gerold Tandler, Bavarian Interior Minister -Langemann's political bosses (306).The CSU not only had its private intelligence-gathering agency run by Hansvon Stauffenberg, but also used the CSU's political foundation, the Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung, as its external covert action arm. The Chairman of the Board of Directorssince 1975 and Director of the International Department was Archduke Otto. HSSoperations were truly international: active in pro-Contra fundraising andpropaganda, exporting intelligence equipment to Idi Amin, supporting Mobutu inAfrica, diverting state development aid from Germany into right-wing party coffers inEcuador. HSS activities notably accelerated after 1977 when the foundationobtained a massive increase in funding from the State: its grant from tax-payers'money went from DM 1.9 million in 1977 to DM 13 million in 1980 (307). The scaleof HSS parapolitical operations can be judged by a report, circulated amongst theCSU leadership and believed by them to stem from the BND, on the CIA's operativeinterest in the HSS:"23rd March, 1979.Personal and confidential: recipient's eyes only.CIA operative interest in the Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung.1. Initially unconnected indications of CIA focuses for intelligence-gatheringon the Federal Republic of Germany have confirmed that the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung [CDU foundation] and above all the Hanns-Seidel-Stiftungare of operative interest to the American agency. Up until now the Friedrich-Naumann-Stiftung [FDP foundation] and the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung [SPDfoundation] have not been mentioned.2. The interest in the HSS is due to indications that have led the CIAmanagement to believe that the HSS is active directly on behalf of theBavarian Prime Minister both for foreign intelligence-gathering as well as forthe execution of quasi-diplomatic or clandestine measures (covert action*) [*inEnglish in the original].It appears that the CIA believes that some of the HSS representatives abroadare "private intelligence gatherers for the CSU" who "can only be distinguishedfrom the BND residents by their lower level of typical intelligence tradecraft".The CIA attributes these "para-intelligence service" and "covert action"activities (political and financial exertion of influence, "business mediationuseful for the party including arms trading") to the HSS in the followingcountries: first Namibia, Zaire and Nigeria, then Morocco, Togo, Greece,Portugal, Turkey, Manila, Hong Kong/Peking, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, finallythe United States itself and "South America". For the business mediation,alleged HSS links to Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohn, Krauss-Maffei, AirbusIndustries and companies in the foodstuffs and pharmaceutical sectors aresupposed.3. According to all appearances, the CIA reckons on systematic intelligencetasking by the MfS [East German intelligence] and the KGB against HSSrepresentatives (and their offices) abroad, and [the CIA] sees here a potentiallyrich source for tips for their own counter-intelligence service working againstthe Eastern Bloc agencies" (308).HUMAN RIGHTS AND RELIGIONA major activity for the Cercle complex from 1975 onwards was a relaunch ofthe Cercle/AESP's 1973 'Peace without Frontiers' appeal to collect prominentsignatures on the theme of free movement of persons and ideas. Damman details theuses for the thousand signatories to the Academy's appeal in his Note 229:"This group of a thousand people can constitute a force if we manage to use itwisely. The organization and the use of this force should be studied by abrain-trust like the one organized at Mr. Vallet's house which dealt with theproblems facing South Africa ... Europe must convince America that beyondthe nuclear strike-force, the ideological weapon is more powerful if we havethe means to use it ... The funding for an ideological campaign represents onetenth of a percent of the enormous budget allocated to nuclear andconventional weapons ... A spiritual alliance between Europe and Americamust find means more powerful than those available for the Soviet strategy ofpropaganda. We must make ourselves masters of the media in the free world"(309).The negotiations in Helsinki which included Basket III, the human rightschapter, had culminated in July 1975 with the signature of the Final Act.Nonetheless, the Cercle complex was sceptical about the Soviet Union's willingnessto respect its commitments. Crozier records that a senior KGB officer felt that theHelsinki Agreements were "one of the Soviet Union's greatest triumphs since WorldWar II" (310). The complex therefore pursued the issue of human rights in the mid tolate 1970s. In a cassette message to Damman dated 16th October, 1975, Violetreferred to the campaign as part of the Academy's programme for the coming year:"The Soviet Union had tried to hurl a spear at the heart of Western Europe,but, whilst it was in the air, the West succeeded in changing the spear into aboomerang ... if, by 1977, the Soviet Union does not want to liberalize itsregime, it will have to confront a growing pile of dossiers on human rightsviolations. And all of this is due to the active campaign for free movement ...we must talk of the release of political prisoners ... that is an outline of theprogramme for the Academy for the beginning of 1976" (311).In 1977-78, the Cercle intensified its campaign against the Soviet Union onthe theme of human rights violations, coordinating its actions as in the past betweenthe four main pillars of the Cercle's European network - Belgium, Britain, Franceand Germany; indeed, the coordinated campaign may well have been one of the firstoperations of Crozier's newly founded 6I. The first indication of this relaunch is givenin a notation in Damman's diary dated 6th January, 1977 which reads:"7.19 am: Quartier Leopold station, departure for Zürich. Arrival 1.59 pm -Hôtel Baur au Lac. 5 pm: meeting with Jean Violet and Alain de Villegas.Dolder Dinner - plan prepared for Operation H2 [Helsinki 2]" (312).This meeting came just before the conference in Belgrade that was to studythe implementation of human rights under the Helsinki II treaty. The Academylaunched a mailshot campaign attacking the Soviet Union for human rights abuses:on 3rd April, 1977, Damman noted in his diary: "Start of Operation H2, the firstletters have been sent" (313). Damman's diary also records that part of the campaigninvolved the AESP buying full-page advertising space in Le Figaro for its appeal. InMay 1977, the ISC relayed the AESP campaign with the publication of a ConflictStudy entitled Human Rights - Soviet Theory and Practice.Another angle to the complex's human rights attack on the Soviet Union wasto mobilize right-wing Christian groups on the issue of the repression of religiousworship in the Soviet Union. This was of course familiar territory for Violet andDubois who had worked with Catholic networks behind the Iron Curtain in the1960s for the SDECE. The complex's activity was both intense and influential:Damman's diary for 1st October, 1977 records that AESP representative JacquesJonet was received by the Pope, no doubt in connection with the complex'scampaigns. Besides the Helsinki II operation, the Cercle also ran a specific religiouscampaign called the "Bible-prisoners" action, referred to in Violet's note of 31stMarch, 1976 about the Cercle's cash crisis, quoted above. Further details of thiscampaign emerge from another entry in Damman's diary dated 31st October, 1977:"Vincent van den Bosch has announced a demonstration for Saturday, 10thDecember at 2pm, to be held in front of the Soviet Embassy. Free circulationof the Bible, freedom of religion and thought, re-opening of churches, releaseof prisoners - organized by Solidarité Chrétienne Internationale (internationalcommittee for freedom of conscience and religion)" (314).Besides running SCI, Vincent van den Bosch, Secretary-General of CEDI, wasa central figure in Damman's complex of groups, serving as a member of the AESPPermanent Delegation and as Secretary-General of MAUE - and also having metCrozier twice in 1976 at the February AESP Chapter Assembly and again at theDecember CEDI Congress. The campaign for religious freedom in the Soviet Union,like the general human rights campaign, was coordinated between three of the mainpillars of the complex: Belgium, Britain and Germany. To support thedemonstrations and mailing actions undertaken by the AESP in late 1977, the ISCbrought out a Conflict Study on the Prague-based Christian Peace Conference inJanuary 1978, The CPC - Human Rights and Religion in the USSR.The AESP and the ISC were not the only Cercle associates to support thesecampaigns; the Cercle's German friends also contributed. As we have seen, theGerman pillars of the Cercle throughout the 1970s had been Strauss's CSU,represented by Cercle/6I member Count Hans Huyn, and the Swiss group ISP, runby AESP partner Karl-Friedrich Grau. In late 1977, the Cercle's German friends setup a specialized group to support the campaigns on religious freedom being run bythe ISC and the AESP – a German equivalent to the earlier British-basedCSRC/Keston College.This new group was the Brüsewitz Centre, a "Christian" group whose aimwas to "publicize human rights violations and particularly the violations of thefreedom of worship in the so-called German Democratic Republic". Founded inOctober 1977, the Brüsewitz Centre was named after Oskar Brüsewitz, an EastGerman priest who burned himself alive in August 1976; the priest's widow tried invain to prevent the group using his name. The founding body for the BrüsewitzCentre was the Christlich-Paneuropäische Studienwerk (Christian PaneuropeanStudy Group), itself founded in July 1977 and chaired by Otto von Habsburg'steenage daughter, Walburga von Habsburg (315). The Brüsewitz Centre's Boardincluded several well-known faces: Habsburg, Huyn and von Merkatz, all three earlyassociates of the AESP. On the Board of the Brüsewitz Centre, we also find theCzech exile Ludek Pachmann, whom we have already met as a speaker for Grau'sISP in 1975-76 along with Habsburg and Huyn. Habsburg, von Merkatz andPachmann of the Brüsewitz Board would all also serve on the Board of AmnestyInternational's right-wing rival, the IGfM/ISHR.The Brüsewitz Centre's Board would also include five other Germans who willcrop up in later Cercle operations in the 1980s. The first of these was HansFilbinger, member of the PEU Council and CDU Regional Prime Minister of Baden-Württemberg from 1966 to 1978, when he was forced to resign following a scandalabout his past as a military judge in Hitler's Navy; he died in 2007. In July 1977,four months before the creation of the Brüsewitz Centre, Filbinger had been one ofthe founding members of the Ludwig-Frank-Stiftung, a far-right pressure group ofGerman politicians and businessmen that organized conferences together withfascist parties such as the German NPD and Italian MSI. Based in Munich, the LFSset as its aim "to resist the dangers of a Popular Front and Eurocommunism". LFSactivities concentrated on right-wing trades unions, and it had close links to the farRight including the Comitato Tricolore degli Italiani nel Mondo, a PEU affiliate closeto the Italian MSI. The LFS journal was another channel for anti-Socialistdisinformation, e.g. "There are people in Bonn who are financed by the East. One ofthem is Mr. Brandt". Many German associates of the Cercle complex would be Boardmembers of the LFS, amongst them Habsburg. The LFS's inaugural internationalconference in February 1978 was attended by representatives of several groups closeto the Cercle complex: the Paneuropean Union, the Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung, theBrüsewitz Centre, the IGfM and the IfD (described below).The second of the five new faces on the Brüsewitz Board was also a cofounderof the LFS, the Bavarian Heinrich Aigner. A CSU MP in the GermanParliament from 1957 to 1980, Aigner would represent the CSU in the EuropeanParliament throughout the 1980s; he died in 1988. A Chairman of the Bavarian PEUsection, Aigner also served as Board member and later Vice-President of the GermanPEU section. In 1982 Aigner would visit Paraguay with Filbinger as part of an LFSdelegation paid for by the German Foreign Office. In 1983, Heinrich Aigner's sonHeinz, a CSU member and intimate of Strauss, founded the Institute for German-Paraguayan Relations for the Promotion of Trade and Culture, a pro-Stroessnerpropaganda group, which organized a planned visit by Stroessner to Germany in1985. With Löwenthal, Heinz Aigner attended the 1981 joint WACL/CAUSA congressin Asuncion, hosted by Stroessner and Pinochet.The third Brüsewitz Board member of note was Dr Lothar Bossle, a memberof the Central Committee of German Catholics and one of the most vocal opponentsof liberation theology. Having been a socialist student activist in his youth, Bosslewould switch to the CDU in 1959; from 1960 to 1963, he worked at the GermanArmy School in Koblenz before being assisted by Filbinger in becoming Professor atthe Pedagogical High School in Lörrach. In 1972, Bossle was active within the Aktionder Mitte group which used industry millions to publish election propaganda againstthe socialist-liberal coalition ("One dose of socialism – from 1933 to 1945 – was quiteenough!"); in 1974, he was a co-founder of the pro-CSU campaign group KDK. In1975, he courted controversy in calling Allende a "socialist Hitler" and then applyingthe same treatment to Willy Brandt and Olof Palme. Bossle would become one ofPinochet's most fervent supporters in Germany ("Chile is on the path to truedemocracy" (316)) and a key contact person for the German group in Chile, ColoniaDignidad, linked to the Chilean secret service DINA, which Bossle visited at leastfour times.Bossle's big break would come in 1977 when Strauss intervened with CultureMinister Hans Maier to override the Julius Maximilian University of Würzburg'sAcademic Senate, Nomination Committee and Faculty Council and have Bossleappointed as Professor of Sociology. His inauguration would be marred by massivefaculty protests, and Bossle's Sociology Department would later become notorious asa 'degree mill', handing out doctorates to those who had the money and who sharedBossle's world-view. In 1977, the year of his university appointment, Bossle joinedFilbinger and Aigner within the Ludwig-Frank-Stiftung and the Brüsewitz Centre.Like fellow Brüsewitz Board members Habsburg, von Merkatz and Pachmann, Bosslewould serve in the IGfM, sitting on its Honorary Presidium. The Sociology Professorwould also sit on the Scientific Council of the Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung and frequentlyattend seminars organized by the International Conference for the Unification of theSciences, the Moonies' scientific front group (317).More significantly, whilst at Würzburg, Bossle would act as Director and laterPresident of the Institut für Demokratieforschung (IfD, Institute for DemocracyResearch), one of whose Board Members was Cercle member Count Hans Huyn. In1977, the IfD published Huyn’s contribution to the Cercle’s post-Helsinki humanrights campaign, Menschenrechte und Selbstbestimmung (Human rights and selfdetermination).A European Conference for Human Rights and Self-Determination, no doubt another forum for the Cercle complex, had been foundedin Bern in 1974; Huyn had been a co-founder of the Conference and would laterserve as its Vice-President. In 1977, the IfD would also support the fledglingBrüsewitz Centre, publishing the report Oskar Brüsewitz: Sein Protest – sein Tod –seine Mahnung (Oskar Brüsewitz: his protest – his death – his warning). The IfDwould later publish a German version of Crozier's Conflict Study Surrogate Forces ofthe Soviet Union which had originally appeared in February 1978, and Bossle wouldorganize a 1979 conference by Crozier at the Sociological Institute of WürzburgUniversity (318).Bossle's IfD had extensive intelligence contacts - the IfD's scientific directorwas prominent CDU MP and later Brüsewitz Board member Heinrich Lummer,whose numerous Libyan trips were financed by the BND; the deputy scientificdirector was former Major-General Gerd Helmut Komossa, from 1977 to 1980 headof Germany's military security service, the MAD. A close associate of Bossle's on theBoard of the IfD was Prof. Dieter Blumenwitz, Professor of International andConstitutional Law at Würzburg University from 1976 on, who shared Bossle's closelinks with Chile and would reportedly visit Colonia Dignidad with Bossle. In 1979,Blumenwitz was one of the co-authors with Crozier of Pinochet's ChileanConstitution; in 1980, Blumenwitz intervened on behalf of Colonia Dignidad in legalproceedings seeking to block Amnesty International's German section frompublishing allegations that the colony had served as a secret DINA torture centre(319). Like many of the Cercle's German friends, Blumenwitz was also a BoardMember of the IGfM and an adviser to and author for the Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung.Another partner of Bossle's was Dr. Günter Rohrmoser, a frequent speaker for boththe LFS and the IfD, and one of the most active Board members of IGfM. AnHonorary Professor of Philosophy at Cologne University in the 1960s, Rohrmoser likeBossle would be assisted in his academic career by Filbinger, who secured hisappointment as Professor of Social Philosophy at Hohenheim University in 1976where he would serve for twenty years until becoming professor emeritus in 1996.With connections like these, it is not surprising that the IfD attracted notoriety;Bavarian SPD MP Dr. Heinz Kaiser tried unsuccessfully to raise questions about theIfD in the Bavarian Parliament, speculating that it might be a covert BND trainingcentre.To return to the Brüsewitz Centre, the fourth new face on the Board was CSUMP Hans Hugo Klein, a former Development Minister (therefore in charge ofgovernment grants to the Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung), and a member with Grau andHuyn of the Deutschland-Stiftung. In 1977, the same year the Brüsewitz Centre wasfounded, Klein led a parliamentary delegation from the CDU/CSU on a trip to SouthAfrica; their conclusions, reported in Deutschland-Magazin, were that "South Africamust not fall". Klein was also a member of the Bilderberg Group, later attendingtheir 1986 conference in Gleneagles. He would later serve as Vice-President of theGerman Parliament from 1990 to 1994 and died in 1996.The final new face on the Brüsewitz Board that we will meet again in the1980s was Professor Nikolaus Lobkowicz, an Austrian aristocrat born in Praguewho would later acquire American nationality. A former President of MunichUniversity and later President of the Catholic University of Eichstätt bei München inthe 1980s, Lobkowicz was, with Rohrmoser, one of the most active Board Membersof IGfM where Lobkowicz was responsible for links with the "freedom fighters" groupResistance International, of which he was a Member of Honour (320); he also servedas a member of the prize jury of the CSU's Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung.Amongst the speakers for the Brüsewitz Centre, we find the televisionpresenter Gerhard Löwenthal, inseparable team-mate of Ludek Pachmann. In 1977,the year the Brüsewitz Centre was founded, Löwenthal became President of theDeutschland-Stiftung. That year, the Deutschland-Stiftung's Adenauer prize wasawarded to Otto von Habsburg; the guest speaker was Franz Josef Strauss. In 1980,Crozier, Löwenthal, Pachmann and Huyn would work together in one of the Cercle'smost ambitious operations: the attempt to ensure "Victory for Strauss" in the 1980Chancellorship elections. Another speaker for the Brüsewitz Centre was Brigadier-General Heinz Karst, a speaker for the Swiss ISP in 1975-76 together with Habsburg,Huyn and Pachmann of the Brüsewitz Board. Karst was also a member of theDeutschland-Stiftung with Löwenthal, Grau, Huyn and Klein.THE AESP IN 1977-78As we have seen, the danger that the AESP would be forced to close its doorsas a result of the 1976 cash crisis was soon averted thanks to the provision ofminimum financing by Violet. By 1977, the Academy's finances were again healthy:Damman's diaries from 1977 to 1979 make frequent mention of large cash transfersfrom de Villegas to Damman. At this time, Elf was paying the bulk of the enormoussums that would change hands for the sniffer plane project. As with the last-minuterescue of the Academy, it is not possible to prove that the considerable fundspassing through Damman's hands from Violet and de Villegas came from the snifferplane project. The only evidence we have is Damman's diary; it is however eloquent(321). On 7th January 1977, Damman's diary records the payment from de Villegasof "one million plus two hundred thousand"; the next day, Damman received FS4,000 from Jonet and 100,000 from Violet. The payments from de Villegas toDamman would continue: in November, 200,000, in December, 50,000, in January1978 75,000 (4/1/78) and in March 20,000. Aldo Mungo, Damman's deputy andlater author of an exposé on the AESP, claims that the unspecified currency is in factSwiss francs. In July and August 1978, de Villegas' contribution would be enormous:315,000.De Villegas' generosity in July and August 1978 may well have beenconnected with the signature of a second contract between Elf and de Villegas'sniffer plane company Fisalma on the 24th June 1978. The new contract stipulatedthat Elf would pay Fisalma a further 500 million Swiss francs, half of which was dueupon signature. The contract gave Elf the right to inspect the internal workings ofthe sniffer plane technology which would allow them finally to detect the fraud inMay 1979 after warnings from Alexandre de Marenches that the sniffer plane dealhad been set up by an "international swindler". However, before the house of cardscame crashing down, de Villegas provided the total funding for a new centralsecretariat for the AESP and all of its satellite groups. The Cercle Charlemagne, asthe new offices were called, was equipped with its own printing press and a centralfile of the 10,000 AESP contacts. However, the Cercle Charlemagne would not last;inaugurated in April 1978 by Habsburg in the presence of Damman, de Villegas, deBonvoisin and many leading lights of the European Right, the centre burnt downonly five months later.Despite this setback, the AESP would continue to expand throughout 1978.On the 12th May that year, the AESP's earlier contacts with the International Societyof Wilton Park via its President, René-Louis Picard, were formalized by the creationin Rome of CLEW, the European Liaison Committee of Associations of Friends ofWilton Park. According to CLEW's statutes, four of the nine founding members weremembers of the AESP: Violet, Sanchez Bella, Jonet and Picard, the latter beingappointed President of CLEW for a three year term (322).Another internal AESP document gives us a clear picture of the Academy'sinternational outreach in 1978: an AESP membership list from the month of June,headed "Strictly confidential document for the exclusive use of H.E. the Ambassadorof H.M. the King of Morocco" (323). The interconnection between the sniffer planeproject and the AESP are clearly demonstrated by this mention. On 29th May, 1978,the King of Morocco was informed by Elf that "a new detection procedure" hadlocated two oil fields near Fez and Taza. On 21st June, 1978, Damman's diaryrecords that a dossier had been prepared for the Moroccan Ambassador; themembership list undoubtedly stems from this dossier. From 19th to 30th August,1978, de Villegas' sniffer planes carried out a comprehensive oil prospectionprogramme in Morocco.The membership list shows that by 1978 the AESP had become a major nexuspoint for the Cercle complex. The Academy's aim of absorbing the members of CEDIand PEU had been achieved, as most of the international and national leaderships ofboth organizations figured on the AESP list. Another recurring theme was theAtlantic Alliance - the AESP now included the Presidents of the Atlantic Committeesin Italy, France, Germany and Belgium, and spokesmen from NATO and Radio FreeEurope. Former Allied combatants were represented by their international andEuropean associations, alongside Lt-Colonel Dr Jean-Victor Marique, the Presidentof the Brussels Reserve Officers organization and President of the AESP MilitaryCommittee since at least November 1974 - interesting in the light of Bougerol's workwith reserve officers in the Brussels region from 1974 on.The AESP's executive body, the Permanent Delegation, had also grown to nowinclude Huyn, van den Heuvel, Vallet and Valori, an indication of the closerinternational ties the AESP now possessed. Besides this broadening of organizationalcontacts, the AESP's Life Members also expanded to include several prominentpoliticians, a reflection of the political influence the AESP wielded by 1978. Joiningthe previous core of Life Members composed of Habsburg, Pinay, Violet, FatherDubois, Sanchez Bella, Fraga Iribarne, Andreotti, Pesenti, Lombardo, von Merkatz(who died in 1982) and Vanden Boeynants were politicians such as JacquesSoustelle of OAS fame, and a trio of Monday Clubbers - Sir John Biggs-Davison ofthe PEU Central Council and SIF, CEDI International President Sir Peter Agnew, andCEDI Vice-President and SIF President Sir John Rodgers.The German presence in the AESP in 1978 would illustrate a future majorfocus for the German Paneuropeans – the European Parliament, for which the firstdirect elections were held in June 1979. Having controversially acquired dualGerman nationality in 1978, Habsburg himself would be elected as a CSU MEPduring the EP’s first term and would serve twenty years there, sitting on the PoliticalAffairs Committee from 1979 to 1992, chairing or co-chairing the Delegation onRelations with Hungary from 1989 to 1999 and sitting on the Committee on ForeignAffairs, Security and Defence Policy from 1992 to 1999. From 1979 on, Habsburgwould be assisted by CSU MEP Heinrich Aigner, who held the powerful post ofChairman of the EP Committee on Budgetary Control continuously until his death in1988.Two new German Life Members of the AESP in 1978 would later joinHabsburg and Aigner in the EP. The first was CSU MP and Bavarian Minister DrFritz Pirkl, Chairman of the Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung from its creation in 1967 untilhis death in 1993; two years before joining the AESP, Pirkl had attended the 1976CEDI Congress. The second new AESP Life Member and future MEP was theGerman Count Franz Ludwig Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, a CSU MP from 1976to 1987 and a Vice President of the German PEU section (324). Both Pirkl and vonStauffenberg would sit in the European Parliament from 1984 to 1992 and servewith Habsburg on the Bureau of the European People's Party group within the EP.Von Stauffenberg would sit on the key EP Committee on Legal Affairs and Citizens'Rights from 1984 to 1987 before becoming its Chairman from 1989 to 1992; Pirklwould function as Chairman or Deputy Chairman of the Delegation for Relationswith Austria from 1985 to 1993, just before Austrian accession to the EU on 1stJanuary 1995.A third significant German Life Member of the AESP in 1978 was Dr HeinrichBöx, former ambassador and head of the CDU's Bureau for Foreign Relations, whodied in 2004. In 1949, Böx had been appointed by Adenauer to a short-lived post asSecretary of State in the Chancellor's Office. By 1961, he worked as German traderepresentative in Finland, before serving as German Ambassador in Norway from1964 to 1966 and in Poland from 1966 to 1970. In 1976, whilst working as Head ofthe CDU's Bureau for Foreign Relations, Böx was suspected of espionage activitiesfor a foreign power. Böx was presumably cleared by the investigation, as the 1978AESP membership list still referred to him as Head of the CDU's Bureau for ForeignRelations. Böx would complete the Cercle complex's networking of Germanconservative foreign policy spokesmen - the CDU's Dr. Marx and the CSU's CountHuyn had served within Habsburg's CEDI since 1972, and both men had been closeallies of Grau's Frankfurt and Swiss groups throughout the 1970s.The AESP Study Groups also encompassed new members: Grau, alongstanding member of the Study Groups, brought in Swiss Colonel FernardThiebaud Schneider, a speaker for Grau's ISP from 1975 onwards, bringing thetotal of ISP speakers within the AESP to four: Grau himself, Habsburg, Huyn andSchneider. A new Italian member of the AESP's study groups with parapolitical linksis Professor Leo Magnino, an official in the Ministry of Public Education and listedby the AESP as President of the University of the Mediterranean. The Universitystarted life as the International Academy of the Mediterranean, founded in Palermoin 1951; Magnino was its Chancellor from 1971 to 1974. The President of theAcademy was Gianfranco Alliata di Montereale, a major figure in Italian parapolitics.A right-wing monarchist prince and mason, Alliata was a member of P2 and closeassociate of Gelli's with links to American intelligence dating back to the SecondWorld War. At Alliata's initiative, an American Academy of the Mediterranean wasfounded in Mexico City in 1958, the same year that would see the creation of theTecos, the Mexican branch of WACL, which perhaps more than any other branch,was responsible for WACL's opening-up to fascism. Other sponsors of the AmericanAcademy were Salazar and Andreotti. In a meeting held on 26th October, 1968 atPalazzo Barbarini, plans were drawn up to establish the International University ofthe Mediterranean, no doubt the organization headed by Magnino in 1978. In the1968 meeting, it was decided that the pro-rector was to be Monsignor Antonio deAngelis, previously pro-rector of the University for Social Studies Pro Deo, Pro Deobeing the right-wing Catholic organization subsidized by U.S. intelligence and run bythe Belgian priest Felix Morlion.On the domestic (Belgian) front, the AESP had been continuing closecooperation with the PIO counter-subversion group. Contacts between Bougerol,Damman and PIO's political master Benoît de Bonvoisin intensified in the late1970s. Having visited the AESP Chapter Assembly in February 1976 and the CEDICongress in the following December, both times accompanied by de Bonvoisin andboth times meeting Brian Crozier, Major Bougerol remained in touch with the AESPthroughout 1977. In the September/October 1977 issue of the MAUE/AESP journalEurope Information which also circulated the Cercle’s post-Helsinki "Appeal forFreedom", Florimond Damman announced: "December 1977, date yet to be fixed: alecture by Major Bougerol at the Université Libre de Bruxelles on the theme"Subversion, the ultimate weapon?" with slideshow on the events of May 1968".Entries in Damman's diary confirm that Bougerol gave his lecture for MAUEmembers on 13th December, 1977, and a further entry in Damman's diary dated30th December 1977 makes reference to a meeting with Bougerol to discuss Inforep.The close cooperation between the AESP and de Bonvoisin was formalized bythe latter's inclusion in the 1978 AESP membership list as a member of the AESP'sStudy Groups. A MAUE circular produced for the European elections in June 1979shows that by then de Bonvoisin had also been taken up as a Advisory Boardmember of MAUE. In 1978, de Bonvoisin was at the height of his official power,serving as adviser to Defence Minister Vanden Boeynants as well as providingconsiderable financial and logistical backing for PIO. Indeed, since 1976, deBonvoisin's company PDG had been subsidizing PIO to the tune of over one millionBelgian francs a year. As would later become apparent, de Bonvoisin and VdB hadalso continued funding for the NEM Clubs implicated with Bougerol in the rumoursof a coup d'etat in 1973. By 1978, the fascists funded by these two CEPIC/AESPmembers were setting up a network of cells within the Gendarmerie who would laterbe the main suspects in the wave of destabilization in Belgium in the early 1980s.However, de Bonvoisin's support for PIO and Bougerol's ambitious expansionof PIO activities was not without risk. In a 1978 letter, Bougerol's partnerCommissioner Fagnart of the SDRA military security service warned him of growingconcern within the Belgian military and intelligence community about his apparentlylimitless horizons for PIO:"I don't want to give details of the defects of your ship, as you know them aswell as I do, if not better. However, offhand, I quote:a) the discretion of your "network" is insufficient (whether this be yourfault or not);b) the infiltration of this network must be considered not as possible butas probable, if not certain;c) you are invading other people's turf - don't yell! You want examples:- how would you, or can you, justify your rôle in the occasional missionsof people going to Zaire or elsewhere?- are you sure that all you ask of your correspondents is justified withinthe strict framework of your activities?d) what do your correspondents in the official services - Gendarmerie,Sûreté, etc - think of you, and what rôle do they think you are playing?But .. I don't think I have to convince you!We could imagine another danger:a) if a "plumber" [burglar] visited the avenue d'Auderghem [PIO militarybranch] or perhaps the rue Belliard [PIO civilian offices in a buildingshared with CEPIC, PDG and later MAUE];b) if messages or telephone calls were intercepted;c) if what you said at the "secret" meetings were to be divulged;d) if there was a leak about the Saoud affair or the affairs concerningFormosa, Spain or the UK, incidents which you should consider as "tobe foreseen".It's impossible for you to fit these into the framework of your official duties (forPIO or others).- of course, I know as well as you do that without taking risks, youwould remain inefficient. But I want to convince you to reduce theserisks to what is strictly necessary. (Sorry if I am being tough, but ourfriendship allows me to be, and forces me to be so.)- what to do?a) start again on the basic principle of absolute need-to-know, above allfor those matters that go beyond your official mission;b) create an unassailable and solid justification with reference to theofficial mission in each of your actions;c) for this, re-define this official mission and always advance this cover toeveryone.- Last argument which isn't scientific at all: I feel that the danger isimminent" (325).The danger was indeed imminent; the "semi-private, semi-public" PIO wasremoved from the Army hierarchy in December 1978 after the death of Bougerol'sprotector, Lt-Gen Roman, Chief of the Army General Staff. Despite this, PIOcontinued to function until at least 1980 as a private group financially supported byde Bonvoisin (326).THE AESP, P2 AND P7We have already noted the presence of former top P2 member Giancarlo EliaValori in AESP circles from 1972 onwards; Valori figures on the 1978 AESP list as amember of the Academy's executive body, the Permanent Delegation. According toallegations made in 1988 by Richard Brenneke, three other leading AESP memberswere involved in a CIA funding channel for P2 called P7. Before detailing Brenneke'sclaims about P7, it is necessary to learn more about the man as a source.Brenneke's reliability has frequently been called into question, not least of allbecause his statements revived media investigation into alleged negotiationsbetween future CIA chief William Casey and senior Iranian officials in October 1980.The negotiations by Reagan-Bush campaign manager Casey aimed to ensure thatthe 52 US hostages captured in the Teheran embassy would not be released beforethe November 4th presidential election to ensure that no "October surprise" wouldallow President Carter to gain another term in office (327).Whilst there clearly was a campaign to discredit his "October surprise" claims,Brenneke made matters worse by embroidering his evidence to inflate his personalinvolvement in the "October surprise" and P2/P7 stories. His claimed rôle in actuallygoing to Paris for the October 1980 negotiations was proved to be false wheninvestigation of his credit card records showed him to be at home in Oregon at thetime. Nonetheless, his account of the Paris meetings was corroborated by multiplewitnesses from America, Iran, France and Germany; a court challenge on charges ofperjury in May 1989 ended with Brenneke being acquitted unanimously on allcounts. With all its resources, the US government was unable to prove that the mainparticipants named by Brenneke (Bush, Casey and Donald Gregg) were where theysaid they were on the weekend of the meetings - and this two weeks before thepresidential election. On Brenneke's reliability, Sick comments:"The bottom line on Brenneke was that he had access on occasion toinformation that was extremely sensitive and known to only a few individuals.When he spoke publicly about any of these issues, however, he exaggeratedhis own rôle and tried to place himself at the centre of the action. The basicinformation was often true, but the flourishes and claims of firsthandknowledge were often false" (328).Having seen the strengths and weaknesses of Brenneke's testimony, we canconsider his allegations about P2/P7. Brenneke claimed to have been personallyinvolved in CIA funding of the P2 lodge via P7 from 1969 through to the 1980s. Onthe strength of his past record, one can doubt the degree of his personalinvolvement, but the details he gives of P7 as a funding channel for P2 arepersuasive. Brenneke provided a 30-strong list of members of P7, amongst whom wefind three of the longest-serving AESP members: Ivan-Matteo Lombardo (joinedAESP in 1970; by 1978, a Life Member), Vittorio Pons (AESP founding member, by1978 on the Permanent Delegation) and Ernest Töttösy (in contact with Dammansince 1961; by 1978 a member of an AESP Study Group). In 1972, Valori, Pons andTöttösy attended the Academy's XVth Grand Dîner Charlemagne; in 1976, all threeattended the XIXth Grand Dîner Charlemagne. Pons and Töttösy met a second timein 1976 at the 25th CEDI Congress. In 1977, Töttösy set up the Comité Hongrie1956-76 to commemorate the revolution; its address was the familiar building at 39,rue Belliard, home to CEPIC, PDG, PIO and later MAUE. The list of its Boardmembers is revealing: alongside Töttösy, the Board included Damman, Lecerf, Victorde Stankovich, Bernard Mercier, Francis Dessart and Jacques Borsu.The late Victor de Stankovich was another Hungarian exile who also figuredon the P7 list - of the five Belgians on the P7 list, three were linked to Damman:Pons, Töttösy and de Stankovich. De Stankovich was a fervent Atlanticist and aformer contributor to Radio Free Europe, Voice of America and Report and Dispatchfrom NATO. Bernard Mercier was a Board member of CEPIC, named with deBonvoisin and Vankerkhoven in the 1981 Sûreté report as financial backers of theFront de la Jeunesse and the NEM Clubs. An intimate of Bougerol's, Mercieraccompanied Bougerol and CEPIC Senator Angèle Verdin to Spain after Franco'sdeath to visit his grave; all three then went on to attend the 25th CEDI Congresswhere they met Töttösy and Pons. A 1983 Sûreté report repeated allegations by WNPmembers that Mercier was a regional representative/inspector of the WNP. FrancisDessart was closely linked to the Moonies, WACL and the ABN; he was also one ofAginter Press's contacts in Belgium along with two other Board members of theComité Hongrie 1956-76, Damman and Lecerf. Jacques Borsu was a formercomrade-in-arms of French mercenary Bob Denard and leader of the neo-nazi PartiEuropéen. Having organized paramilitary training camps for the Flemish fascistVlaamse Militanten Orde (VMO), he was one of the co-defendants in a 1981 trial ofVMO leaders (329).Whilst Brenneke's testimony frequently exaggerated his own involvement andfalsified the truth in the process, the fact that Damman's AESP connected key P2member Valori and alleged P7 members Lombardo, Pons, Töttösy and de Stankovichseems to give some credence to Brenneke's allegations.FARI AND FREEDOM BLUE CROSSJean Vigneau, editor of Violet's ISC outlet, Le Monde Moderne, was also listedas a member of the AESP's study groups in 1978. Although the Bulletin de Paris andthe Centre du Monde Moderne had had to close as a result of the 1976 fundingshortage, Le Monde Moderne magazine continued publication, and carried an articleon Angola by Robert Moss in 1977. In 1978 however, whilst continuing to work withLe Monde Moderne, Crozier launched a new vehicle for ISC reports. Together withCercle and 6I member Georges Albertini, Crozier founded Le Monde des Conflits, amagazine devoted exclusively to circulating ISC studies in the French-speakingworld. Seven issues had appeared by September 1979, but the publication was notyet financially viable (330).Despite the collapse of the Centre du Monde Moderne, the Cercle'spropaganda effort on behalf of Pretoria was not weakened; with funds from theSouth Africans, Cercle members Crozier, Moss and Amery had set up a new outfit,FARI, in 1976. Throughout 1977, FARI supported the Cercle's campaign in favour ofSouth Africa by stressing Pretoria's strategic importance for the West: An AmericanView on the growing Soviet Influence in Africa (FARI no. 5, 1977), The Need tosafeguard NATO's Strategic Raw Materials from Africa (FARI no. 13, 1977), and twopublications by FARI Deputy Director Ian Greig, Barbarism and CommunistIntervention in the Horn of Africa (FARI no. 15, 1977) and Some Recent Developmentsaffecting the Defence of the Cape Route (FARI no. 17, 1977), an update of the ISC'sSpecial Report of March 1974 (331).Greig followed these in December 1977 with his book, The CommunistChallenge to Africa, which included a preface by Lord Chalfont. The book waspublished in the UK by Stewart-Smith's FAPC and in South Africa by the SouthAfrica Freedom Foundation (SAFF), a Department of Information front which alsopaid for trips to Pretoria for Robert Moss and Major-General Sir Walter Walker (332).The FAPC would follow this publication by that in 1978 of The Bear at the Backdoor -the Soviet threat to the West's lifeline in Africa, written by Walker with an introductionby Amery. The book, whose cover illustration showed a Soviet bear cutting a petrolline running from the Gulf around the Cape to Europe, accused the US intelligencecommunity of harbouring pro-ANC sympathies. Also in 1978, Janke of the ISCwould help Jan du Plessis of the Foreign Affairs Association, another South AfricanDoI front, to compile the 1978 Freedom Annual (333).Much of the FARI output would be recycled by Count Hans Huyn in hisOctober 1978 book, Der Angriff - Der Vorstoss Moskaus zur Weltherrschaft (TheAttack - Moscow's Thrust for World Domination). Huyn's book, a German-languagevehicle for the UK counter-subversion lobby, illustrated the degree of mutualrecycling of Cercle propaganda, listing no less than sixteen ISC Conflict Studies,eleven FARI reports and four issues of the East-West Digest and quoting prolificallyfrom Crozier, Moss, Greig and Amery, all FARI members. Huyn also recycled theanti-Labour propaganda produced before the 1974 British elections, particularly Notto be trusted - Extremist Influence on the Labour Party Conference by Geoffrey Stewart-Smith, future director of FARI. Besides these British Cercle friends, Huyn also drewon several of the Cercle's international contacts for his book: Vigneau of Le MondeModerne and AESP, Barnett of NSIC/WISC, Gerstenmaier and Rohrmoser of theIGfM, and Sager of SOI, five of whose publications were quoted.In 1978, the British and American ends of the Cercle complex would also seekfunding from multinational companies for Crozier's recently founded privateintelligence service, the 6I. In June 1978, the NSIC, FARI, the ISC and Aims held ajoint conference in Brighton on "NATO and the global threat" which aimed to raiseprivate-sector funds to supplement the activities of the official agencies, "crippled"after the earlier US Congressional Committees and the official "closure" of Britain'sIRD in the spring of 1977. The "Brighton Declaration" adopted by the conferencestated that "the destruction of the CIA and other assaults on Western intelligencesources make it imperative that the US and its allies should again take the initiativeon intelligence, information and counter-intelligence". The conference called for theestablishment of a "new" industry-funded group, Freedom Blue Cross, to carry outthese private propaganda activities and also to act as a further relay for the SouthAfrican Department of Information's campaign. In all likelihood, Freedom Blue Crosswas intended to be merely a funding front for Crozier's 6I.For the Cercle complex, the Brighton conference was attended by Crozier,Greig, Chalfont, Tanham of the WISC Board, and NSIC/ISC benefactor Dick Scaife.The South African delegation included the former head of the South African NavyAdmiral James Johnson, Cas de Villiers and Jan du Plessis of the DoI front group,the Foreign Affairs Association, and Gideon Roos of the South African Institute ofInternational Affairs. Besides other ex-military personnel and academics fromBritain, Europe, South Africa and Japan, the conference also brought togetherrepresentatives of many of the British-based multinationals which had also beenfunding the four British anti-union groups: Taylor Woodrow, Tate & Lyle, Barclays(Tennant?) and National Westminster banks, Vickers, British American Tobacco andthe British subsidiary of ITT, Standard Telephone Cables (STC).Despite the impressive roll-call of companies, big business' interest waslukewarm (National Westminster and STC formally disassociated themselves fromthe Declaration; the other companies did not), and nothing apparently came ofFreedom Blue Cross. However, the following year, Crozier would continue trying toraise funds from British and German industry for his "transnational securityorganisation" by circulating a planning paper entitled The Multinationals andInternational Security, as detailed in secret German intelligence reports by HansLangemann, described below (334).THE AESP, THE ISC AND 6I IN 19791979 would bring two major organisational upheavals in the Cercle complex.In Belgium, Florimond Damman died in July, and the AESP would be riven byinternal rivalries for his succession, a struggle eventually to lead to its closure. InBritain, some of Crozier's colleagues in the ISC had become concerned at Crozier'sother activities. "Partly for security reasons, partly because I did not want to involvethe ISC Council in my extra-curricular activities, I had not taken any member of itinto my confidence about the creation of the 6I. I can only assume some indiscretionwithin Whitehall, presumably from one of the few officers of SIS [MI6] who wereaware of it: Lou [Le Bailly] and Leonard [Schapiro] both had intelligence contacts"(335). Things came to a head when Le Bailly offered a letter of resignation from hispost on the ISC Council, stating that Crozier's high profile and other activities wereundermining the objectivity and efficiency of the ISC. The conflict escalated to end asa straight choice: Crozier's resignation as Director of the ISC or the resignation ofseveral if not most of the ISC Council members. As Crozier felt that "my 'other' workwas more important than running the ISC" (336), Crozier resigned his position inSeptember 1979, to be replaced as ISC Director by Michael Goodwin with Ian Greigbecoming Senior Executive (337). "Within weeks of my departure, the entire researchstaff of the ISC had been sacked. Not long after, the research library I had built upover many years was disposed of ...". Despite this upheaval, the ISC would continueunder a different guise, as will be described in a later chapter.Crozier's resignation from the ISC did however allow him to concentrate hisefforts on the 6I which left ISC premises to set up in offices on Trafalgar Square.With a reserve of $30,000, Crozier expanded the staff of the 6I and began publicationof a monthly restricted newsletter, Transnational Security. "The recipients ofTransnational Security ... fell into three categories. The top layer, which included thePresident [Reagan] and Mrs Thatcher, consisted of the Western and friendly ThirdWorld leaders, selected politicians, and friendly secret services. In the second layer,as of right, were contributors to our funds. The third layer consisted of our ownpeople: agents and associates in various countries" (338). The bulletin would laterchange title to become Notes and Analysis.One early task for the 6I was to recreate the ISC's liquidated research libraryby compiling "a reference archive of quotations from the already published words ofhundreds of extremist politicians and trades unionists, as raw material for analyticalreports in the Shield manner. In charge was a former MI5 man who had brought medisquieting information about the paralysis of the Security Service in the late 1970s"(339).Crozier records that two early operations for the 6I were in Latin America andin Iran prior to the 1979 revolution. In Argentina, Uruguay and Chile, the 6I advisedthe armed forces and the security services in "the use of some of the non-violent,psychological techniques with which we had been experimenting in Europe" (340).Crozier also spent several days closeted with General Pinochet, drafting fourteenarticles of the new Chilean Constitution.Apart from supporting Pinochet and other Latin American regimes, the 6I wasalso increasingly concerned by the instability of the Shah's regime in Iran in themonths preceding the Islamic revolution. Here again, the 6I's experience inpsychological warfare techniques was needed; the brutal repression by the Shah'ssecret service SAVAK and the armed forces served only to feed the rising tide ofIslamic fervour. Jean Violet in particular urged Crozier to travel to Iran to talk withthe Shah. General Douglas Brown who managed the Dulverton Trust, one of theISC's financial backers (341), found an intermediary for the Cercle in the person ofGeneral Alan Fraser, South Africa's Consul-General in Iran. The only non-Afrikanerto hold the post of Chief of Staff of the South African Defence Force, Fraser was apersonal friend of the Shah. In the spring of 1978, Crozier flew to Teheran where hemet Fraser; the two men were then received by the Shah, who seemed reluctant toheed Crozier's warning that the CIA would not act to save the Shah and thatpsychological operations by the 6I were necessary to counter the climate ofrevolutionary unrest.Shortly after this first visit to Teheran, Crozier met Prince Turki ben Faisal,brother of the Saudi Foreign Minister, who six months earlier had replaced hisuncle, Turkish-born Kamal Adham, as head of the Saudi intelligence service. Assuch, Turki ben Faisal would become a key link in the covert war waged againstSoviet forces occupying Afghanistan by the coalition of the CIA, the ISI - thePakistani military intelligence service which created the Taliban - and the Afghanimujaheddin, including one of Turki's personal contacts, Osman bin Laden. Inrecognition of his services, Turki would be one of the Taliban's guests of honour atthe proclamation of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan in Kabul on 28th April 1992.Turki would become one of the world's longest-serving intelligence chiefs, hisreign lasting from September 1977 until August 2001 just prior to the WTC attackwhen, as an all-too-visible personification of US-Saudi links, he was removed ashead of the Saudi intelligence service to assuage growing anti-American feeling inSaudi Arabia. However, he was too valuable a man to lose and after a "decentinterval", he would re-emerge in 2003 as Saudi Ambassador in London where heplayed a prominent rôle in the media drive for war with Iraq (342).This first contact between Crozier and Turki ben Faisal was arranged via DanMcMichael, administrator of the Scaife family's trust funds, a major source offunding for the ISC. Crozier briefed the Saudi prince about the 6I and its initialcontact with the Shah. A proposed second meeting with Prince Turki ben Faisal inthe summer of 1978 would not come off, but Crozier and the Cercle would finallymeet the Saudi intelligence chief again at a Cercle meeting in Bavaria in the spring of1979 when Turki ben Faisal would accept to act as the main backer for a planned 6Iradio propaganda operation in the Middle East, detailed in the next chapter.In the meanwhile, the Shah was reconsidering Crozier's offer of 6I help forpsy-ops campaigns and contacted Turki ben Faisal, who put in a good word for the6I. Turki ben Faisal's recommendation of the 6I carried a lot of weight for theIranians; Turki ben Faisal was the Saudi representative on the Safari Club, anetwork for covert cooperation between the French, Saudi, Iranian, Moroccan andEgyptian intelligence services, founded by Alexandre de Marenches on 1stSeptember 1976 with headquarters in Cairo (343). Besides Turki ben Faisal'srecommendation, General Fraser had also been advising the Shah to accept the 6I'shelp: "he had raised with the Shah the question of financial assistance for our group,in return for our advice and expertise in combating the wave of subversion thatthreatened to sweep him off his throne" (344). Fraser advised Crozier to involve ISCCouncil member Sir Robert Thompson whose counter-insurgency experience duringthe Malayan campaign and the early stages of the Vietnam War could be useful inthe Iranian context.In August 1978, the Shah reversed his previous decision and invited theCercle to Teheran; although Violet was prevented from travelling due to ill-health,Crozier, Elliott, Thompson, and a team of advisers flew to Teheran on 3rd September.The Cercle team stopped off in France to pick up Antoine Pinay, whose longacquaintance with the Shah would add authority to the Cercle's proposals. TheCercle team met the Shah for two and a half hours, but were struck by his apathy.They then went on to discuss the situation with two top SAVAK officials, GeneralMotazed and the head of the research department, Kaveh. The Cercle and SAVAKofficials discussed a plan to distribute leaflets to split the tacit alliance between theShiite fundamentalists and the Communist Tudeh party.The time was past however for such subtleties; the commander of the Teherangarrison General Oveissi, who had planned to meet the Cercle team, was unable toattend due to the unrest in the Iranian capital. The Cercle's visit came at a crucialtime: the caretaker Prime Minister resigned the day after the Cercle's meetings, andmartial law was declared four days later, just after the Cercle team's return toLondon. In early November, the Shah finally decided to give the go-ahead for theCercle to intervene, and the top civilian in SAVAK flew to London to spend a fullweek closeted with Robert Moss transforming a pile of SAVAK reports on Communistinfluence in the revolution into an ISC Conflict Study, The Campaign to DestabiliseIran. Following publication of the Conflict Study in November 1978, the Shahauthorized a first annual payment of £1 million to the 6I for a psychological actionoperation, but the decision to involve the 6I further would come too late as the Shahwould be overthrown in January 1979 before the payment could be made.The exiled Shah's death in July 1980 would not however end the 6I's interestin Iran; Crozier "felt that there remained at least a fighting chance of a coup tooverthrow Ayatollah Khomeini's fledgling regime. The outbreak of the Iraq-Iran Warencouraged this view" (345). Crozier therefore flew three times to Cairo between Julyand November 1980 to meet the Shah's widow and President Sadat, but nothingwould come of these meetings apart from a 6I report circulated to Mrs Thatcher andPresident Reagan.THE LANGEMANN PAPERSWhilst the 6I launched truly global operations in Latin America and in Iran inlate 1979, they were not neglecting the European scene. Once Margaret Thatcherhad won the general election in Britain in May 1979, the next priority was the 1980election for West German Chancellor, where longstanding Cercle friend Franz JosefStrauss was standing as a candidate.An unprecedented insight into Cercle/6I operations at this time was given bythe 1982 revelations of Hans Langemann, the head of Bavarian State Security. Wehave already met Langemann as a close collaborator of key German 6I member,Hans Freiherr von Stauffenberg and his private CSU intelligence service. Langemannhad served in the BND from 1957 to 1970, where he rose to become Gehlen's deputyfor "Special Operations" working closely with Brigadier-General Wolfgang Langkau,head of the BND's Strategic Service and future technical adviser to the vonStauffenberg network (346). In 1972, Langemann was appointed security chief forthe Munich Olympics before being purged by the SPD government for being too closeto Strauss's CSU party. Langemann then left federal employ to join the BavarianInterior Ministry as head of the "State Protection" Department, in which capacity heacted as top link man between the Bavarian government, Strauss's CSU party, theBavarian regional office of the BfV security service and the BND based in Pullach, asuburb of the Bavarian capital Munich.Unbeknownst to Crozier and the 6I, Langemann had been receiving fullreports on the Cercle from von Stauffenberg (347), information which Langemannthen repeated in a series of secret intelligence reports, addressed to either GeroldTandler, Bavarian Interior Minister, or to Tandler's Private Secretary, Dr. GeorgWaltner, who also received the private intelligence reports from the von Stauffenbergnetwork. Langemann's reports to Tandler and Waltner quoted a planning paper ofCrozier's describing the efforts being made to provide a solid operational basis for the6I by canvassing leaders of industry for financial support. The reports also detailedthe high-level support Crozier could count on - amongst those named in theLangemann papers were two serving intelligence chiefs: Sir Arthur "Dickie" Franks,Chief of MI6 from 1978 to 1982, and the Comte Alexandre de Marenches, Directorof the SDECE from 1970 to 1981. Langemann's reports also revealed that one of themajor goals for the 6I was to shape the future decade by supporting three key rightwingelection candidates in 1979-1980: Margaret Thatcher in Britain, Franz JosefStrauss in Germany, and Ronald Reagan in America."PROTECTED SOURCEContributions to State ProtectionMinister's Eyes Only*****Brian Crozier, London- The Multinationals and International Security (348).- Project Victory for Strauss*****1. The militant conservative London publicist, Brian CROZIER, untilSeptember 1979, Director of the famous Institute for the Study of Conflict,has been working with his wide circle of friends in international politics to setup an anonymous action group ("transnational security organization") and towiden its field of operations. His intention is to approach multinationalcompanies about this group, which was the reason for drawing up thisplanning paper. Not least of all, so as to obtain the necessary funding:$750,000 to start with and up to $3 million. CROZIER has alreadyapproached German industrialists and shown them this paper, despite itbeing stamped "Secret". A new publication Transnational Security is beingprepared so as to promote this project. For the reasons mentioned under item2, it should be pointed out that CROZIER has worked with the CIA for manyyears. One has to assume, therefore, that they are fully aware of his activities.He has extensive contacts with members (or more accurately, formermembers) of the most important (Western) security and intelligence agencies,such as the Comte de MERONGES [sic], ex-Director of the French SDECE(349). Furthermore, it is known that he has a good relationship with Mr."Dickie" FRANKS, Chief of the British Secret Intelligence Service (so-calledMI6) (350); his closest assistant, Mr. N. ELLIOTT was a Division Head in MI6.CROZIER, ELLIOTT and FRANKS were recently invited to Chequers by Mrs.THATCHER for a working meeting. It must therefore be concluded that MI6 aswell is fully aware of, if not indeed one of the main sponsors of, theanonymous security organization.Also very closely connected to Mrs. THATCHER is the prominent journalistRobert MOSS, who is involved in the promotion of the group's media actionstogether with Fred LUCHSINGER (351), Dr. KUX (352) of the SwissIntelligence Service (Colonel BOTTA), and Richard LÖWENTHAL (353).Amongst other points in the planning paper are:- V, iSpecific aims within this general framework are:To affect a change of government in (a) the United Kingdom (accomplished)and (b) in West Germany, to defend freedom of trade and movement and tooppose all forms of subversion including terrorism ...-VI AWhat the group can do:Get certain well-known journalists in Britain, the USA and other countries toproduce contributions. Access to television.Guarantee a lobby in influential circles, whether directly or throughmiddlemen, witting or unwitting.Organize public demonstrations in particular areas on themes to be selected.Involve (exploit) the main security and intelligence services both to obtaininformation and to pass on (feed) information to these agencies.Covert financial transactions for political purposes.- VI BWhat the group can do if funding is available:Conduct international campaigns aiming to discredit hostile personalitiesand\or events.Create our own intelligence service specializing in particular themes.Set up offices under suitable cover, each run by a full-time coordinator.Current plans include London, Washington, Paris, Munich (!), Madrid ...2. As far as can be judged by an outsider, CROZIER has, together with hisgroup, launched the project "Victory for Strauss" using the media or coverttactics applied in Great Britain (major themes, amongst others: communistextremistsubversion of the ruling party and trade unions, KGB direction ofterrorism, crippling of internal security). He will support and direct the futuredevelopment of the project on an international level.However, for the present time, consideration must be given to the fact that thepersonal connections of the CROZIER group, in particular his affinity topersonalities from the secret services, and the tactical and conspiratorial aimsand proposed methods for the "Victory for Strauss" project described in theplanning paper, can in fact be completely identified, even if this was not theirintention. It also appears almost certain that on the basis of his project,CROZIER must provoke sharp defensive reactions from those security andintelligence services whose supervisory heads do not follow his political line,such as the BND and BfV. As CROZIER mentions both his basic plan and theVictory project to those he talks to, the problem this causes is obvious.The possible, but avoidable, consequence may be definitely undesirablenegative publicity.Munich, 8th November 1979Dr. Langemann, Department I F" (354).The mention by Langemann of a working meeting at Chequers betweenThatcher, Franks and the 6I team of Crozier and Elliott shortly after Thatcher'selection victory is highly significant. Franks' presence with Crozier and Elliott at theChequers 6I meeting raises the question whether the support given to Thatcher bythe retired MI6 officers and IRD assets in the counter-subversion lobby was notechoed by serving MI6 officers such as Franks - MI6 Chief from 1978 to 1982.Franks was renowned as a hard right-winger who had sat uncomfortably as deputyto Maurice Oldfield, a man of liberal views. A few months after the Langemann reportwas written, Franks would play a key rôle in circulating the manuscript of theChapman Pincher\Peter Wright book Their Trade is Treachery around Whitehall; hisletter dated 15th December, 1980 was produced as evidence in the AustralianSpycatcher trial as proof that the British Government, MI5 and MI6 had known longin advance that Wright was passing on his allegations of Soviet subversion withinMI5 and the Wilson government to Chapman Pincher.Referring to this author's previous research on the Cercle published in Lobstermagazine in 1988-89, Crozier writes: "Much has been written about the Cercle, fromthe outside, and much of it has been false or misleading. For example, it has beenalleged that it was a forum for bringing together 'international linkmen of the Right',such as myself and Robert Moss, with secret service chiefs like Alexandre deMarenches, long-time head of the French SDECE, and Sir Arthur ('Dickie') Franks,sometime head of MI6. There are pitfalls in writing about confidential matters fromthe outside, and drawing on similarly handicapped material. In fact, neither [de]Marenches nor Dickie Franks ever attended a Pinay Cercle meeting during the yearsI was involved with it: between 1971 and 1985. There was a very good reason why[de] Marenches would never have been invited. The inspirer and long-servingorganizer of the Pinay Cercle was Jean Violet, who for many years had been retainedby the SDECE as Special Advocate ... Inevitably he had made enemies. One of themwas a close friend of the Comte de Marenches who, on being appointed Director-General of the SDECE in 1970, closed down Violet's office without notice. The twomen – [de] Marenches and Violet - never met. As for Dickie Franks, he neverattended Cercle meetings, for the reason that Directors of SIS do not involvethemselves in such private groups. So he was never invited" (355).This denial of links between the Cercle and Franks and de Marenches iscertainly disingenuous, seeking to use the lack of formal involvement in the Cercle todiscount any cooperation with it. Whilst serving Directors of SIS or the SDECE mightnot like to be seen at Cercle meetings, Langemann repeats information from Cercleinsider von Stauffenberg that Franks did accompany the 6I core of Crozier and Elliottto a working meeting with Thatcher shortly after her election victory. As for deMarenches, despite any animosity with Violet, the French Count had been anintimate adviser to key Cercle member Franz Josef Strauss for many years.The "undesirable negative publicity" feared by Langemann did indeed arise:the Spiegel got wind of Strauss's international links and published a two-part seriesin February and March 1980. Besides documenting Strauss's contacts with Spinolaand Arriaga and his covert funding of Fraga Iribarne, Silva Munoz and MartinezEsteruelas, the Spiegel articles revealed Strauss's close friendship with the Comte deMarenches, reporting that Strauss frequently met de Marenches, either at the Piscine(SDECE headquarters) or at Strauss's Paris hotel. The Spiegel also reproduced aletter from Huyn to Strauss dated 13th February, 1979, which mentioned the CerclePinay for the first time:"Furthermore, I would like to inform you that I have just received news fromRiyadh confirming that Prince Turki ben Faisal, head of the Saudi intelligenceservice and brother of the Foreign Minister, will be attending the Cerclemeeting in Wildbad-Kreuth [since 1975, the international conference centre ofthe Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung]. I think his participation will be of particularinterest in view of the Middle East situation [i.e. the overthrow of the Shahone month previously]" (356).Following the initial contact between Crozier and Prince Turki ben Faisal inthe spring of 1978 and the subsequent Cercle meeting in early 1979 referred toabove, the 6I and the Saudi intelligence chief would work together on a propagandaproject detailed in another report by Langemann written on 7th March, 1980. At thesame time as Voice of America was rushing to expand its broadcasts to the Islamicborder populations of the Soviet Union (357), the Cercle/6I was preparing for itsradio debut. Together with the Saudi intelligence service, the Cercle/6I planned toset up a powerful transmitter in Saudi Arabia for propaganda broadcasts to the sametarget audience as VoA: the Soviet Islamic world radicalized by the Iranian revolutionin January 1979 and the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in December 1979. Huynhad already proposed similar action in his October 1978 book Der Angriff - DerVorstoss Moskaus zur Weltherrschaft (The Attack - Moscow's Thrust for WorldDomination), where, as a conclusion, Huyn gave a list of twenty proposals for actionto be undertaken if the West was to "survive in freedom". The ninth proposed actionon the list explains the background to the joint Cercle/6I-Saudi project: "The peoplein the Soviet zone of domination must be given more intensive exposure to objectivenews from the free world …In the hermetically sealed system of non-freedom of theSoviet bloc, the people can only be reached very partially by a few shortwavebroadcasts. These options must be considerably strengthened and expanded; all thedevelopments of modern technology - including satellite television broadcasting -should be used" (358).Langemann's March 1980 report also gave general background information onthe Cercle and specifically dealt with the damaging revelations that had justappeared in the Spiegel:"Contributions to State ProtectionConfidential note for Dr. Waltner, as agreed in conversation.CERCLE(Spiegel, 10/80, pg 23)1. As far as my previous BND knowledge and my current information go, thisCircle, obviously named with the aim of defaming it, consists of a loosegathering of various conservative and anti-communist politicians, publicists,bankers and VIPs from other professions that meets about twice a year invarious parts of the world. Its origins lie with the former French PrimeMinister, Antoine PINAY. The Circle, which also invites guests, still existstoday.The last meeting of the PINAY CIRCLE was held over the weekend of 1stDecember 1979 in the Madison Hotel in Washington. Amongst theparticipants were former Minister NARJES (Germany), former Air MinisterJulian AMERY (UK), former CIA Director William COLBY, Federal BankDirector VOLKERS and Heritage Trust Foundation President FEULNER (USA)(359), as well as Finance Minister PANDOLFI (Italy) (360) and GeneralFRAZER [sic] (South Africa) (361).2. Acting as a kind of coordinator from the original French side is the Parisianlawyer Jean VIOLET who took over the operational side of the Circle as PINAYhimself got older (362).VIOLET has connections to several Western intelligence services; certainly tothe CIA, to the French SDECE, to the British SIS and to the Swiss MilitaryIntelligence Service, particularly to its Head of Procurement, Colonel BOTTA.3. GEHLEN, who was always interested in the undertaking, its personalitiesand its results, recruited VIOLET as a "Special Contact" and for many yearsprovided him with DM 6,000 a month. GEHLEN claimed that this sum hadbeen agreed with the head of the SDECE, at that time General JACQUIER[1962-1966], because VIOLET was receiving the same amount from theSDECE.As I was the main operative for GEHLEN's "Special Operations", I met withVIOLET on many occasions in his Paris flat, together with my fellow operative,the late Marchese de MISTURA.Certainly, VIOLET and I never discussed the PINAY CIRCLE in any detail.However, I did once give him DM 30,000 from GEHLEN "for this purpose". Thereporting to this complex, which also included the French statesman POHER,was essentially channelled through Special Contacts Dr. Johannes SCHAUFFand the late Klaus DOHRN. Later, the Parliamentary Secretary of State in theChancellor's Office, Baron GUTTENBERG, personally gave me the task ofkeeping "the dubious Mr. VIOLET" (cover name: Veilchen - Little Violet) underobservation for counter-espionage purposes. Nothing came of this for reasonsI don't need to go into here.One should stress however that VIOLET himself has never boasted of possiblecontact with the Prime Minister [Strauss], although GEHLEN andGUTTENBERG always insisted on this. As politically coloured gossiping andrumour-mongering are basically "not professional" in counter-espionage, Inever attempted to ask VIOLET about this, whether directly or by hinting at it.GEHLEN accepted this, and in particular, my direct superior at the time,General LANGKAU (Strategic Service), specifically approved it.4. Recently, we have noted the establishment of a "command staff" or InnerCircle which develops suitable lines of action for current political questions.The activities of Brian CROZIER (Transnational Security) have already beenthe subject of previous reports.On the 5th and 6th January, 1980, a group from within the Circle met inZürich to discuss executive measures. VIOLET led the meeting; amongstothers present were Count HUYN MP, Brian CROZIER (previously a longtimeCIA agent), Nicholas ELLIOTT (former Division Head in the British SIS), formerGeneral STILWELL (ex-US Defence Intelligence Agency), and Mr. JAMESON(ex-CIA).The main themes for discussion included:a) international promotion of the Prime Minister [Strauss].b) influencing the situation in Rhodesia and South Africa from a EuropeanConservative viewpoint.c) the establishment of a powerful directional radio station in Saudi Arabiaaiming at the Islamic region and including the corresponding borderpopulations of the Soviet Union.Note:These commendable goals have not been tackled with sufficient attention paidto protecting secrecy in my view. Therefore, negative publicity cannot be ruledout. There is simply too much "loose talk". There is an urgent need forprofessionally restricted consultation on foreign intelligence service influencesboth here and abroad.Munich, 7th March, 1980Dr Langemann, Department I F" (363).Langemann's comment about the emergence of a "command staff or InnerCircle" illustrates the difficulty in separating the functions of the Cercle as aconfidential discussion forum and the 6I as a covert intelligence agency. Crozierhimself comments on this in referring to this author's previous articles on the Cercle:"To describe it [the Cercle] as a forum is strictly accurate. There were no members ina formal sense. It was an informal group of broadly like-minded people, who mettwice a year, once in America, once in Europe. Usually, some distinguished figurewas invited to speak. Amongst the guest speakers at times when I was present wereStrauss, Henry Kissinger (for whom I interpreted), Zbigniew Brzezinski, DavidRockefeller, and Giulio Andreotti. Within the wider Cercle, a smaller gathering calledthe Pinay Group met on occasion to discuss possible action. ... Some outsiders havejumped to the wrong conclusion that the Pinay Cercle was the same as my 'secret'organization. ... There was in fact some minor overlapping, but the functions of the6I, which I have been describing, were quite different. Some members of the 6I's'Politburo' also attended the Cercle meetings; others did not. Most members of theCercle were unaware of the existence of the 6I. Many on the 6I's networks had noconnection with the Cercle" (364). Certainly, Langemann's "Inner Circle" or isvirtually identical to the 'Politburo' of the 6I: Violet, Crozier, Elliott, Huyn, Stilwelland Jameson, the latter two being described below. Only a few of the 6I 'Politburo'members were not in attendance at this "command staff" meeting, amongst themWalters, von Stauffenberg, Albertini and Horchem.Langemann also mentions for the first time two further intelligence veteranswho served on the 6I's 'Politburo', the first of whom was four-star Army GeneralRichard G. 'Dick' Stilwell, formerly of the Defence Intelligence Agency. Stilwell hadworked closely with the CIA in the 1950s and 1960s to develop US counterinsurgencypolicy, being the author of "one of the most influential documents of thepast quarter-century" (365), the 1959 report Training under the Mutual SecurityProgram which coined the term "pacification" (366). Stilwell's policies laid thegroundwork for the American pacification program for Vietnam which would beimplemented successively by three Cercle contacts - Thompson, Komer and Colby(367). After serving in the DIA, Stilwell was appointed Reagan's Assistant Secretaryof Defence in charge of administration, and joined the ASC Board and the 'Politburo'of the 6I while in this post (368).The second 6I 'Politburo' member mentioned by Langemann was Donald'Jamie' Jameson, the CIA officer and Russian expert who had first debriefedGolitsyn, the defector who "confirmed" the fears of the ultras within the CIA, MI6 andMI5 about Soviet penetration of the British government. Whilst at the CIA in theearly 1950s, Jameson had played a peripheral rôle in the creation of the Congressfor Cultural Freedom (369). After leaving the CIA in 1973, Jameson set up the"private" defector reception group, the Jameson Institute. Besides this, Jameson wasalso Vice-President of the Washington-based "risk assessment consultancy",Research Associates International, Ltd, and worked with General Graham and Clineas an adviser to the Nathan Hale Institute, founded by Raymond Wannall, formerAssistant Director of the FBI's Intelligence Division (370).VICTORY FOR STRAUSSThe outlines of the operation to promote Strauss as candidate for the GermanChancellorship in the 1980 elections are quite clear: within a month of the JanuaryCercle meeting, Crozier in Britain and Löwenthal in Germany had launched acoordinated pro-Strauss campaign. The task was not easy: Strauss's previous runfor the Chancellorship in the early 1960s had been dashed by his murky reputation,already tarnished in the 1962 "Spiegel Affair" which revealed that he hadorchestrated the illegal extradition from Spain of the magazine's chief editor, ConradAhlers. In June 1963, the Spiegel alleged that Strauss had been involved in a fraudwhilst serving as German Defence Minister; he was later exonerated but the scandalscotched his chances of rising from Defence Minister to the Chancellorship. In themid-1970s, Strauss would be implicated in the Lockheed bribes scandal anddisastrous German purchase of the Starfighter or "Widowmaker" aircraft (371). Thistime around, the Cercle was determined to discredit the Spiegel's relentlessrevelations of Strauss's parapolitical links. The tactic used was the old ploy ofaccusing awkward journalists of being in the pay of the Kremlin. Within a month ofthe January 1980 Cercle meeting, Löwenthal had founded a Strauss support group,the Bürgeraktion Demokraten für Strauss. The group's posters alleged theexistence of a systematic anti-Strauss campaign steered from Moscow:"Germans! Do you know who is behind the anti-Strauss campaigns?Journalists financed by East Germany, cheque fraudsters, dope smokers,terrorist sympathizers, Communists and unfortunately also Social Democrats.Stop this left-wing Popular Front!" (372).The same theme was played on by Crozier who from February onplanted pro-Strauss articles in Sir James Goldsmith's magazine NOW!, for whichCrozier edited an entire section from 1979 to 1981. One article by Crozier, publishedon 15th February 1980, dealt in depth with the allegations made by the Spiegel in1963. Goldsmith himself later joined in the campaign; on 21st January 1981, headdressed the Conservative Media Committee in the House of Commons on "TheCommunist Propaganda Apparatus and Other Threats in the Media". In his speech,he quoted the Czech defector Major-General Jan Sejna who "admitted that thecampaign by the German news magazine Der Spiegel to discredit Franz Josef Strausswas orchestrated by the KGB". The Spiegel naturally sued. Goldsmith then employed20 researchers for three years to back up his case, claiming to have interviewedevery major defector from the Eastern bloc in the last three and a half years (373).By 1984, however, Goldsmith was seeking to retreat from his previous claims:in a speech to the Defence Strategy Forum of the NSIC in Washington on 24th May,1984, whilst repeating that the KGB was behind the campaign against Strauss, headded: "this does not mean that the publications or journalists in question wereknowingly involved or that they were aware that their views were being manipulatedand used by the Soviets for their own purposes" (374). Goldsmith's case collapsedwhen one of his star witnesses, the temporary Soviet defector, Oleg Bitov, returnedto the Soviet Union. Bitov later wrote of the episode in the Moscow Literary Gazette(375), in which he alleged that Crozier was coordinating the research from hisRegent Street office. Goldsmith tried to postpone the case but eventually an out-ofcourtsettlement was reached between the Spiegel and Goldsmith, with Goldsmithpaying his costs. Despite this legal retreat, Goldsmith took out full-page adverts inthe British and German Press, declaring the Spiegel to be "a victim of thepropaganda techniques of the KGB" (376). Much of Goldsmith's research was laterrecycled by Chapman Pincher who devoted three chapters to this second "SpiegelAffair" in his 1985 book, The Secret Offensive.THE REAGAN CAMPAIGNThe final Cercle document from this period came not from Langemann butfrom German investigative journalist Jürgen Roth, who published the minutes of thenext Cercle meeting, held in Zürich on 28th and 29th June, 1980. The "Victory forStrauss" campaign was in full swing, but despite Crozier and Löwenthal's efforts, itwas not going well, particularly because of the revelations in the Spiegel in Februaryand March. Besides following progress on the Strauss project and the radio stationin Saudi Arabia, the Cercle turned their attention to the looming AmericanPresidential elections:"A further meeting of the Circle was held under the chairmanship of Violetand attended by those present at the previous meeting, including ColonelBotta of the Swiss Intelligence Service and Fred Luchsinger, head of the NeueZürcher Zeitung.1. The prospects for positive influence on the election campaign in favour ofStrauss cannot be judged to be very favourable. While the many promotionalinfluences in US, UK and Swiss newspapers were welcomed by their readers,their impact in the Federal Republic lagged far behind. Furthermore, it seemsdoubtful that Strauss will be able to match the dynamic foreign policyinitiatives that Federal Chancellor Schmidt has been able to make. In contrastto the situation in the US, where President Carter is confronted with theshattered remains of his foreign policy - difficult to present favourably for theelection campaign, even in part - Schmidt has understood how to make clearand prominent political steps which represent an achievable goal for thepopulation's desire for peace. Luchsinger said that he was prepared toproduce a series of three leading articles highlighting the tendency of currentgovernment policy in Bonn to weaken NATO. Crozier felt that similar stepscould be tried again through Moss in London and the Baltimore Sun in the US(377).2. Count Huyn reported on his meeting with the head of the Saudi securityservice about the establishment of a short-wave radio transmitting towardsthe Soviet Union. The Saudis were interested, he said, and had guaranteedfinance on the condition that a situation such as that created in Moscow byRadio Free Europe and Radio Liberty must be avoided at all costs.3. A discussion was held about a series of appropriate measures to promotethe electoral campaign of Presidential candidate Reagan against Carter. Elliottreported that in this context, positive contact had been made with George [H.W.] Bush as well (378).4. Colonel Botta stated that in his opinion, support must be given to theIsraeli intelligence service. It was noted that, as far as Europe was concerned,the efficiency of the service had diminished considerably" (379).The presence of several former CIA or DIA officers during the Cercle'sdiscussions on the promotion of Ronald Reagan is indicative: participants at theCercle's earlier "command staff" meeting in January 1980 had included not onlyViolet, Crozier, Elliott and Huyn, but also Jameson and Stilwell, the latter an ASCBoard member. At the time of the Cercle meeting, the ASC Foundation waslaunching an intense media campaign against Carter for "disarming America todeath" through the SALT 2 Treaty. The ASCF produced a film called The SALT 2Syndrome that was notably used in South Dakota to oust Senator George McGovern.The film was shown eleven times on the three major state television channels and asa film or videotape it was screened to over 1,000 audiences. ASC official John Fisherstated:"In the last three months of the campaign ... ASCF increased its average TVshowings from 30 a month to 180 bookings per month for a total of 1,956showings during this election year" (380).Within ten days of the Cercle meeting of 28th-29th June, Crozier flew out toLos Angeles to brief Reagan personally on the 6I and offer its services. Crozier wasnot the only one to contact Reagan or his campaign team; also in early July, theComte de Marenches met William Casey, Reagan's campaign manager, in Paris. DeMarenches, who wrote in his memoirs that "under Carter, the Americans committedvoluntary suicide", shared with Casey not only a total disdain for Carter but also apast in the Resistance during the Second World War and an arch-conservativeapproach to both politics and intelligence work. De Marenches was well placed toadvise Casey on the Iranian hostage crisis; he had been the driving force behind theSafari Club, founded in 1976 to coordinate covert cooperation between the French,Iranian, Saudi, Moroccan and Egyptian intelligence services.One month after the de Marenches-Casey meeting, Casey would fly to Madridfor a series of meetings with senior Iranian officials to negotiate the framework for adeal to delay the release of the Teheran Embassy hostages. The key meetings tofinalize the "October surprise" deal were held in October in Paris under thebenevolent eye of de Marenches's SDECE; in September, Alain de Marolles, SDECEDirector of Operations and principal deputy to de Marenches, had given the goaheadfor French arms dealers to supply Iran with military equipment in directviolation of Carter's embargo (381). After Reagan's election victory, de Marencheswas invited to meet the President-elect and flew to California on 21st November,1980 to advise him on selection of Administration personnel and policy. Above all, deMarenches warned Reagan not to trust the CIA, particularly because of its lack ofpurposefulness:"Reagan repeated [de] Marenches's warning - "Don't trust the CIA" - to GeorgeBush, who had been CIA chief in 1976-77. Bush thought it was hogwash, butall the same it obviously left a deep impression on Reagan. Bush had alreadytold one of his CIA friends that, given Reagan's detached management styleand his unfamiliarity with intelligence matters, it was important the Presidenthave a CIA director he felt close to, someone he trusted fully, particularly onthe issue of purposefulness. Now, after the [de] Marenches warning, that waseven more important" (382).The man to whom Reagan offered the job - within days of his meeting with deMarenches - was someone the French spymaster approved of entirely: WilliamCasey.So, of the three Cercle candidates, Thatcher and Reagan were victorious.Although the campaign to promote Strauss for German Chancellor failed and theBürgeraktion Demokraten für Strauss disbanded, it was revived in June 1981 as apolitical pressure group called Konservative Aktion. The KA President was LudekPachmann; Löwenthal was Chairman of the Board, which also included Dr LotharBossle. KA also had excellent contacts with the German security and intelligenceservices: the adviser for KA's Internal Security Working Group was Crozier's old ISCfriend Horchem, who had just retired as head of the Hamburg BfV. KA's speaker onGerman and East European policy was Prof. Hans-Werner Bracht, from 1961 to1972 a senior lecturer at the German Army Psychological Warfare School inEuskirchen, with a spell from 1969 to 1970 in the Political Division at NATOheadquarters in Brussels. In this context, it is interesting to note that the ArmyPsychological Warfare School had previously provided Grau's ISP with one of itsmost frequent speakers in the mid-1970s, the School's Director Dr Kurt Klein. Onefurther KA member was Brigadier-General Heinz Karst, also an ISP speaker, and amember of Löwenthal's Deutschland-Stiftung and of the Brüsewitz Centre. Whilstmarginal, KA would draw headlines due to its uncompromising hard-right slant andthe frequent violence shown by younger militants at KA anti-immigrationdemonstrations and during attempts to storm squatted houses. In 1983, KA wouldpierce a hole in the Berlin Wall; it would also circulate letters in Turkish urgingTurkish immigrants to return home. In 1986, a KA demonstration for the release ofRudolf Hess and a KA circular insulting Willy Brandt would lead to dissensionamongst KA's leading members; several prominent conservatives including Karstresigned, and the Board was purged by Pachmann and Löwenthal. KA would file forbankruptcy in September 1986 and be finally dissolved in 1989 (383).As we have already seen in the early 1970s, the Belgian members of theCercle complex often had more robust plans than election rigging in mind. In theearly 1980s, the Belgian politicians linked to the Cercle were again implicated infunding fascists who were planning another coup d'état with a group of extremeright-wing sympathizers in the Gendarmerie (384).1981 - 1991FORWARD TO VICTORYTHE BELGIAN STRATEGY OF TENSIONA 1981 report by the Sûreté de l'Etat makes it clear that the Belgian membersof AESP\MAUE who had been implicated in the rumours of a planned coup in 1973had not given up hope. The Sûreté report dated 11th May, 1981 was submitted byJustice Minister Philippe Moureaux to the Wijninckx Committee, a Senate committeeinvestigating the extreme Right and their private armies (385). The report revealedthat leading members of CEPIC, including Paul Vankerkhoven, Bernard Mercier andBenoît de Bonvoisin (now running MAUE after Damman's death in 1979), had beenfunding two extreme right-wing groups also implicated in the 1973 coup plans: theFront de la Jeunesse, a major Belgian fascist group run by Francis Dossogne andPaul Latinus, and the Nouvel Europe Magazine, edited by Emile Lecerf. Lecerf andDossogne had represented Belgium at the 1975 gathering of European fascists at deBonvoisin's castle. The Sûreté report further revealed de Bonvoisin's continuedfinancial support for Bougerol and the PIO publication Inforep, Bougerol's rôle as aspeaker at NEM Club events and his close links with Bernard Mercier of the CEPICBoard.The NEM Clubs, composed of readers of Lecerf's Nouvel Europe Magazine, hadbeen implicated with Major Bougerol in the 1973 coup plans by the de Cock andTratsaert reports; the de Cock report had already alluded to the financing of the NEMby VdB and de Bonvoisin in the early 1970s. By the 1980s, the NEM Clubs were alsothe recruiting pool for the most notorious of the fascist private armies, WestlandNew Post, headed by former Front chief Paul Latinus. The WNP was far more than agroup of rowdies: it appeared to run a full-blown parallel intelligence service withlinks to the Sûreté; Latinus himself was a major Sûreté informant. The linksbetween the WNP, the Front de la Jeunesse and CEPIC were multiple: besides thefunding of the Front and the NEM Clubs disclosed in the 1981 Sûreté report, 1976CEPIC election candidate Joseph Franz had joined CEPIC straight from the Front.Former CEPIC President Jean-Pierre Grafé appealed directly to the Front for helpwith his election campaign. Front billstickers ensured CEPIC's election postercoverage - when they couldn't cope, the WNP's poster team filled the gap. Lecerfpublished appeals to vote for CEPIC in his Nouvel Europe Magazine. A 1983 Sûretéreport repeated allegations by WNP members that Mercier of the CEPIC Board wasalso a regional representative/inspector of the WNP.The WNP had been infiltrated by Commissioner Christian Smets of theSurêté, after Smets's superior, Chief Commissioner Victor Massart, had recruitedWNP leader Latinus as a Sûreté informant (386). Massart appointed Smets asLatinus's case officer, and Latinus duly introduced Smets into the group as "theDuck", a sympathizer from the Sûreté. To prove his good faith, after checking withheadquarters, Smets gave the WNP lessons in surveillance and counter-surveillance.In February 1982, in the middle of Smets's training course, WNP militants used theirnewly-gained knowledge to stalk and then kill two people. The arrest of the WNPmilitants and the confession of the killer, Latinus's lieutenant Marcel Barbier,brought Smets's "membership" of the WNP to light by 1983, whereupon theestablishment and left-wing Press had a field day. It was clear that a serving Sûretéofficer had been caught red-handed training a fascist private army guilty of a doublemurder. The uproar was enormous, leaving the Sûreté compromised and Smetsaccused of being a fascist sympathizer colluding with the WNP through politicalconviction. Fired on by the Press and by de Bonvoisin, Smets could only weaklyclaim to have been following orders from his Sûreté superior Massart who was in thefront ranks of his attackers, proclaiming Smets had acted totally without authority.Smets was condemned on all sides; even the NEM and other fascist publicationsvociferously joined in, covering Brussels with posters reading "Sûreté assassin!".With hindsight and later information, the situation looks radically different: itnow appears that the WNP scandal was the successful culmination of an operationto sabotage Sûreté investigations into de Bonvoisin's patronage of fascist groups. Theoperation was as effective as it was ingenious: Smets, whose investigations posed areal threat to de Bonvoisin, Bougerol and the extreme Right, was tarred with thefascist brush and publicly vilified. With Smets disgraced and his team closed downas a result of the WNP scandal, the investigations into the links between deBonvoisin, Bougerol and the fascist militias came to an end. If collusion there wasbetween the Sûreté and the WNP, it was between Massart and Latinus with the aimof compromising Smets. Later investigations into Gladio and PIO revealed thatMassart, Smets's superior, had been the principal contact in the Sûreté for VdB/deBonvoisin's intelligence chief, Bougerol. Massart gave open access to Sûreté files forBougerol and his team. Smets's enquiries were a threat not only to CEPIC and theNEM Clubs, but also to Massart. Bougerol's visits were no secret at the Square deMeeûs (Sûreté headquarters); after it could no longer be overlooked that PIO hadofficially been closed down, Massart's cooperation with Bougerol continued viaBougerol's secretary, Mirèze Legon, who regularly visited Massart to view Sûretéfiles. To deflect criticism, Massart had informed his colleagues that Legon no longerworked with Bougerol; Smets, though, working on the de Bonvoisin/Bougerol/NEMtriangle, had Legon followed from Massart's office to ... the PIO military branch office.With the discovery of Massart's ongoing illegal cooperation with PIO, Smets wassimply getting too close for comfort.It will come as no surprise to learn that the WNP leader Paul Latinus"committed suicide" in April 1984 as the WNP scandal gathered pace. Opinionsremain divided about whether the suicide was arranged or not. Latinus could havebeen a key witness not just in the WNP case but also in a vice scandal that hit theheadlines at the same time as the May, 1981 Sûreté report on CEPIC's links to theNEM. Shortly before dying, Latinus had referred to a file that was his "insurancepolicy" - a dossier compromising top politicians in a vice ring: the Pinon file. Dr.Pinon's wife ran a child vice ring in which VdB and other right-wing notables wereallegedly compromised. In early 1981, details of the ring reached Lecerf who wrotean article; perhaps not surprisingly in view of his connections, Lecerf neverpublished the piece. Lecerf may have been the source for Latinus's file. In mid-June,1981, Dr. Pinon gave details of the ring to the left-wing magazine Pour, which hadoriginally exposed de Bonvoisin's fascist connections. Pour's editor, Jean-ClaudeGarot, was preparing to go into print when he received a phone call from a lawyerattempting to prevent publication: Garot refused. Ten days later, the premises ofPour were burnt to the ground by a joint commando group from the Front de laJeunesse/WNP and the Flemish fascist group VMO. Garot never identified thelawyer who phoned him by name, but did reveal that it was "a lawyer from theextreme Right, a member of MAUE". A subsequent detailed study of the Pour casestated that the lawyer was Vincent van den Bosch, a close associate of the lateFlorimond Damman's and longstanding member of the Permanent Delegation of theAESP who served with de Bonvoisin as a Board member of MAUE (387). Van denBosch would later figure in the WNP trials as counsel for WNP killer Michel Barbier.THE BRABANT WALLON KILLERSThe involvement of AESP\CEPIC members with the extreme Right may tieinto the most notorious of Belgian parapolitical affairs - the "Brabant Wallonkillers", a gang of alleged "bandits" who specialized in holding up supermarkets withmaximum violence and minimum loot, killing 28 people between 1982 and 1985.The theory that the killers were motivated by criminal gain – an idea pushed hard bythe Belgian Justice Ministry - was demolished by the wanton killing of unarmed andunresisting shoppers, the highly professional and military approach taken to theattacks, and the provocative tactics employed: on one occasion, having needlesslygunned down several people and seized takings of only several thousand Euros, thekillers sat in the supermarket car-park to calmly await the arrival of the police beforemaking good their getaway. Such provocation, together with the concentration oftheir attacks in one limited area (the Brabant Wallon), even to the extent of drivingdirectly from one attack to hit another supermarket only ten miles away, all pointedto a strategy of tension with political motivations rather than to organized crime.The multiple investigations into the Brabant Wallon killings have thrown upconsiderable evidence that points to the authors of the attacks being extreme rightwingsympathizers within the ranks of the Gendarmerie. One of the actions of thekillers was to break into a warehouse and steal prototype bulletproof vests, whoseexistence was only known to the Gendarmerie and a handful of ballistic experts. Italso became clear that those carrying out the supermarket attacks must have hadintimate knowledge of the tactics called "Practical Shooting", a preserve shared bythe Diane group, the Gendarmerie's anti-terrorist unit, and a series of private"Practical Shooting Clubs" dominated by the extreme Right. Some of the weaponsused in connected attacks had been "stolen" from the barracks of the Diane groupon New Year's Eve, 1981-82.In 1989, sensational allegations about Gendarmerie involvement in thekillings were made by Martial Lekeu, a former member of the Diane Group and alsoof the Gendarmerie's political intelligence section, the BSR. Lekeu alleged that in themid-1970s he was recruited into a secret neo-nazi organization within theGendarmerie, Group G. The Gendarmerie officer who recruited him was DidierMievis, a BSR member and recruiter for the Front de la Jeunesse within theGendarmerie (388). Lekeu claimed that the two external controllers of Group G wereFrancis Dossogne and Paul Latinus, heads of the Front. Lekeu's first contact withGroup G was during a Front meeting held in Latinus's house; Latinus was Lekeu'snext-door neighbour. From 1975 onwards, the Front and Group G, together with acorresponding group in the Army, Group M, planned a coup d'état to bring CEPIC topower. At this time, Vanden Boeynants was President of CEPIC and Belgian DefenceMinister, the supervisory authority for the Gendarmerie. The 1981 Sûreté reportreveals that during this period VdB and de Bonvoisin were giving substantialfunding to Dossogne and Latinus for the Front. Lekeu alleged:"When I joined the Gendarmerie, I was a convinced fascist. I got to knowpeople in the Diane group who shared my opinions. We used to exchange theNazi salute. Every time we smacked our heels together in the canteen or inthe corridors of the BSR headquarters, we heard others doing the same. Itwas a sign of brotherhood ... during the Front meetings, a plan was developedto destabilize Belgium and prepare for an authoritarian regime. This plan wasdivided into two stages: a phase of political terrorism and a phase ofgangsterism. I worked on the second phase. I was one of the specialists whowould train the young people in extreme Right ideology; we had to turn theminto a group of individuals that were ready for anything. Then, I should breakoff all contact with them so that they would become a completely autonomousgroup who would commit armed raids without being aware that they werepart of a perfectly planned plot".The Intelligence section of the BSR were well aware of Group G's activities:according to a BSR report drawn up by Chief Adjutant Tratsaert in October 1976,the BSR had several of Group G's documents, and had infiltrated some of theirmeetings, photographing the group's members. The 1976 report confirms Lekeu'sclaim that Dossogne was a member of the group. Lekeu stated that he left Group Gwhen they started committing the Brabant killings; a 1985 BSR report by AgentBihay declared that Group G included at least one other gendarme closely linked tothe killings: Madani Bouhouche, who was also a member of the WNP. Lekeu furtherclaimed that Group G was behind the 1981 theft of Group Diane's weapons:certainly, Bouhouche was seen in the Diane barracks on the day of the robbery andused one of the Gendarmerie's vans taken later that night by the thieves.According to Lekeu, Group G was not only responsible for carrying out theBrabant killings, but also for launching earlier attempted assassinations whichtargeted Gendarmerie colleagues whose investigations into fraud scandals linked toVdB were getting too close to the truth. Lekeu specifically mentioned the 1981 attackon Gendarmerie Major Herman Vernaillen as a Group G operation. Vernaillen hadcertainly been treading on toes: besides investigating VdB's links to financial anddrug scandals, Vernaillen had been following up indications of VdB's involvement incoup plots. In May 1989, Vernaillen declared that in 1980 the Brussels banker andCEPIC member, Leo Finné, had informed him of a planned coup d'état in the 1980swhich involved several senior figures in Opus Dei and a former Minister. Finné wasin a position to know: it has subsequently emerged that he was involved with VdB inone of the planned coups in 1973. In a confidential report, Vernaillen gave furtherdetails and named participants in the 1980s plot as CEPIC President VdB, formerDeputy Prime Minister and CEPIC member José Desmarets (in 1986-87, President ofWACL, whose Belgian section LIL had worked closely with Damman), StateProsecutor Raymond Charles, former Gendarmerie General Fernand Beaurir, ex-Chief of General Staff Lieutenant-General Georges Vivario (389) and CEPICmember Jean Militis, a paratroop colonel implicated in the rumours of a plannedcoup in 1973. Vernaillen's allegations were backed up in November 1989 by thetestimony before the Parliamentary Committee of Inquiry from another Gendarmerieofficer, Chief Adjutant Dussart, who confirmed the names of the participants in the1980s plot and stated that several of the 1980s plotters had also been involved inthe 1973 plans for a coup: the de Cock and Tratsaert reports had detailed the NEMClubs' involvement in the 1973 plans and named CEPIC members VdB and deBonvoisin.Whilst some figures in CEPIC appear to have been the beneficiaries of thestrategy of tension, others were definitely its victims. As Hugo Gijsels points out,closer examination of some of the people murdered by the Brabant killers duringtheir attacks throws up a remarkable series of coincidences. Several people werecoldly executed with bullets to the head, in contrast to the shooting in thesupermarkets that claimed most victims. Amongst those executed in September-October 1983 were three CEPIC members: Elise Dewit and Jacques Fourez, abusiness contact of VdB's, and Jacques van Camp, innkeeper of the "Auberge desTrois Canards", a favourite haunt for VdB, General Beaurir, Dewit and Fourez. InOctober 1985, the killers claimed an even more significant victim amongst the ranksof CEPIC: banker Leo Finné, Vernaillen's informant, the first person killed in the raidon the Delhaize supermarket in Overijse.This is a very brief summary of an extremely complex series of events, andalthough much remains unknown, it is clear that those who gravitated in theAESP\Cercle Pinay environment were closely linked both to the rumoured plans fora coup in 1973 and to the Belgian strategy of tension in the 1980s. Certain parallelscan be drawn to two previous cases of a strategy of tension: Italy from 1969 onwardsand Portugal in 1975-76. In all three countries, the beneficiary of the strategy oftension was a Cercle Pinay contact - Andreotti, Spinola and Vanden Boeynants. Inall three cases, the operational experience in running a strategy of tension camefrom Aginter Press, Stefano delle Chiaie and fascist militants in the ranks of the localpolice and Army. The most promising avenue for investigation to understand thecoup plots and strategy of tension in Belgium in the 1970s and 1980s lies no doubtin exploring contacts between Aginter Press and the AESP. It is significant thatDamman, Lecerf and Guérin-Sérac met only two years before Lecerf's NEM made itsfirst appeal for a coup d'état - at the beginning of its long and close relationship withde Bonvoisin and VdB. Belgian justice has been notably timid in its investigations,and a full exposure of those behind these events will probably never come, but asone of the top police investigators working on the Brabant killings said about thesniffer plane scandal:"If you're looking for the motives behind the killings in the Brabant, start byunderstanding the motives behind that gigantic swindle" (390).THE CERCLE PINAY AND BANCO AMBROSIANOThe close links connecting the Cercle Pinay and the sniffer plane scandal ofthe late 1970s have already been documented above; in the early 1980s, it emergedthat several Cercle Pinay contacts, including key players in the sniffer plane scandalsuch as Carlo Pesenti, were connected to the 1982 crash of the "P2 bank", BancoAmbrosiano. Under a permanent threat of take-over by Michele Sindona, Pesenti hadshored up his indebted Italmobiliare group by substantial borrowings from BancoAmbrosiano and its various Italian subsidiaries, secured by large blocks of shares incompanies controlled by Pesenti. The relationship between Banco Ambrosiano,Pesenti and the Cercle complex became more explicit in the final months before thebank's collapse in June/July 1982. In late 1981, the Vatican, concerned about thegrowing scandal surrounding Roberto Calvi, had canvassed support for a successor.Their favoured candidate was another prominent Catholic banker, Orazio Bagnasco,active in property-based mutual funds and by 1980 the owner of the CIGA group ofhotels. Bagnasco was known to be very close to Giulio Andreotti; what is less knownis that both Andreotti and Bagnasco had links to the AESP and the Cercle Pinaycomplex. Bagnasco was a participant at the 1976 CEDI Congress along with themain Cercle members involved in the sniffer plane scandal - Pesenti, Pinay, Violet,Damman and Sanchez Bella. As we've also seen, two of the other CEDI participantswere Dr Ernest Töttösy and Vittorio Pons, accused by Richard Brenneke in 1990 ofbeing members of P7, a covert group of lawyers and bankers used by the CIA as afunding channel for P2. Despite Calvi's objections, Bagnasco was appointed DeputyDirector of Banco Ambrosiano on 26th January, 1982.Shortly afterwards, the bank secretly underwrote a loan of 100 billion lire toPesenti to allow him to buy into Banco Ambrosiano. On 10th March 1982, Pesenti'sItalmobiliare became the largest declared shareholder in Banco Ambrosiano, andPesenti was appointed an Ambrosiano director. When the bank finally collapsed inJune/July, Pesenti lost 100 billion lire on his Ambrosiano shareholding alone, andwas forced to sell off another of his banks six weeks after Calvi died. Already in poorhealth, Pesenti did not long survive the Ambrosiano fiasco; he died in September1984. Following the Banco Ambrosiano crash, the Vatican appointed a four-mancommission of inquiry to "investigate" the scandal; of the four commissioners, twowere Cercle Pinay contacts. One was Hermann Josef Abs, the German Bilderberger,European Movement and CEDI member who had met Spinola at Strauss's behestduring the General's 1975 tour to raise funding for a coup d'état. The other was noneother than Philippe de Weck who, with Pesenti, was the main financier implicated inthe sniffer plane scandal. There are further links between the sniffer plane scandaland Banco Ambrosiano quite apart from the repeated presence of the two majorplayers, Pesenti and de Weck: the company used as a conduit for Elf's initial snifferplane payments to de Villegas' Fisalma, Ultrafin, was owned by Calvi and linked toAmbrosiano Holding Luxembourg. One of the Ultrafin shareholders was Ernst Keller,a member of de Weck's Zürich UBS staff responsible for overseeing transfers ofsniffer plane money to Fisalma. De Weck's UBS bank had been one of the majorchannels used by Calvi for milking Banco Ambrosiano; UBS was also one of theprincipal Swiss banks used by P2. Amongst UBS accounts was one of $55 million forGelli and another of $30 million for Calvi and his partner Flavio Carboni (391).PEACE PROPAGANDAA major factor in 1980s politics was the intensified nuclear confrontation inthe European theatre following Soviet deployment of SS-20 missiles from 1977 on.Besides continuing to run the post-Helsinki human rights campaign in the late1970s, the Cercle complex also acted to highlight the Soviet nuclear build-up. After aglowing recommendation by Violet, Crozier's ISC commissioned French nuclearstrategy expert General Pierre M. Gallois, formerly of SHAPE, to produce a ConflictStudy on the SS-20 threat, published in June 1978 under the title Soviet MilitaryDoctrine and European Defence. Gallois was no stranger to the Cercle complex; hehad attended the 1965 Bilderberg conference in Villa d'Este in Italy along with Pinay,Pompidou and Voisin, and since at least 1972 had also sat on CEDI's InternationalCouncil alongside Habsburg, Sanchez Bella, von Merkatz, Vankerkhoven, Huyn andAgnew – by 1978, all AESP members. Gallois would go on to attend Cercle Pinaymeetings (392).After considerable internal debate, NATO decided in December 1979 to stationnew medium-range nuclear weapons - Cruise and Pershing II missiles - in Britain,Germany, Italy, Belgium and Holland, a deployment which provoked a wave ofprotest from the peace movement unseen since the Vietnam demonstrations of theearly 1970s. The European Right and the intelligence services reacted in the earlyeighties much as they had done a decade earlier: by a wave of aggressive counterintelligence,agents provocateurs and smear campaigns to discredit peace activistsas potentially violent KGB dupes or stooges.The Cercle and particularly Crozier's London-based 6I would play a key partin these anti-disarmament campaigns throughout the 1980s; indeed, Crozier'schapter on this period starts with the words: "The best thing the 6I ever did was topenetrate and defeat the Soviet 'peace' fronts and the Western campaign groups ... inthe absence of government reaction in any of the affected countries [sic, see below],it was left to private groups to counter the Soviet campaigns. At the 6I, we took adecision to create new peace counter-groups wherever necessary, and to assist suchgroups where they already existed, both financially and with ideas. It was aconsiderable international coordinating effort which paid off in the end" (393).The most intense of these anti-disarmament propaganda campaigns targetedthe British peace movement. Between 1980 and 1987, the Campaign for NuclearDisarmament (CND), was subjected to an unprecedented propaganda andharassment campaign run essentially by three complexes: firstly, the private-sectorgroups, several of which had links to the Cercle Pinay; secondly, official but covertpropaganda units within the Ministry of Defence; and lastly but certainly not least,MI5's F Branch (Internal Subversion) (394). As we will see below, these State andprivate initiatives interlocked on several levels. One notable link was Charles Elwell,head of F Branch, who had taken the decision to put CND under blanketsurveillance. After retirement from MI5 in 1982, Elwell would work throughout the1980s with Brian Crozier to produce a smear bulletin targeting the Labour Party,progressive charities and church groups, described in a later chapter.FARI fired one of the first shots in the UK anti-unilateralist campaign in theform of a 1980 brochure by Crozier entitled The Price of Peace - a Plain Man's Guide toCurrent Defence Issues; the cover of the FARI brochure illustrated the launch of anSS-20. Published by Stewart-Smith's FAPC and distributed also by the MondayClub, the brochure's tables of the East-West nuclear balance in the brochure wereproduced by the ISC, and the defence expenditure table came from NATO Review.Having conceded that many peace campaigners were sincere, Crozier then went onto ask: "But how many realize that the campaign against nuclear armsmodernisation, in which they are involved, is manipulated by Moscow?" Crozier laterrevealed in his memoirs that the basic research had been done by "a Dutch friend"and that an updated and enlarged version of the brochure would be published in theUS three years later by the Heritage Foundation, on which more below (395).In 1981, with continued if reduced South African funding (396), FARIorganized the first Annual World Balance of Power conference which broughttogether many of the Cercle's American contacts: Feulner of the HeritageFoundation, General Graham of the ASC, Barnett of the NSIC and also of theCommittee on the Present Danger (397), and Cline of CSIS. The conference, whichaimed "to consider the need of the entire non-communist world to respond to theSoviet global political and military threat" started with a message of goodwill fromPresident Reagan.Beyond FARI's efforts, the Cercle also created several new British groupsspecializing in anti-disarmament propaganda, thanks to American funding. In hismemoirs, Crozier records that, after initial hesitation, Reagan's Director of CentralIntelligence Bill Casey provided £50,000 in 1981 and $100,000 in 1982 for theCercle's anti-disarmament campaigns. Major funding would also be provided by theHeritage Foundation, whose President Edwin Feulner had attended the December1979 Cercle meeting. The Heritage Foundation, whose rôle is concealed in Crozier'smemoirs, provided the infrastructure and funding for three Cercle-linked groupsactive in anti-peace movement propaganda in Britain (398). The main beneficiary ofHeritage Foundation funds - receiving an estimated half a million dollars from 1982to 1985 - was the Institute for European Defence and Strategic Studies (IEDSS).Founded in 1979, the IEDSS set as its goal "to assess the impact of political changein Europe and North America on defence and strategic issues, in particular, to studythe domestic political situation in NATO countries and how this affects the NATOposture". The IEDSS Chairman was Heritage President Feulner; the IEDSS Councilincluded Heritage Fellow Richard V. Allen, later appointed as Reagan's first butshort-lived National Security Adviser, in which post he would be a recipient of the6I's confidential briefing papers, Transnational Security (399). Serving on the Councilwith him was an old ISC stalwart: Leonard Schapiro. The IEDSS was closely linkedto the ISC from its inception on; the IEDSS initially shared the ISC's Golden Squareaddress before moving to new premises - two doors away. Several ISC associates alsowrote reports for the IEDSS - Brian Crozier (Communism - why prolong its deaththroes?), the ISC's Turkey expert Kenneth Mackenzie, Richard Pipes of the WISCBoard and Lord Chalfont, the latter serving as a Council member of IEDSS and as aBoard member of FARI with Crozier, Moss and Amery. Heritage Foundation controlover the IEDSS was eloquently illustrated by US Internal Revenue Service figures forthe year 1985: Heritage contributed $151,273 of a total IEDSS budget of $185,611.According to IRS figures, the Heritage Foundation donated $427,809 to the IEDSSfor the three years 1982, 1983 and 1985 (400).Besides its Heritage Foundation/ISC links to the "private sector" for antidisarmamentpropaganda, the IEDSS was also directly tied in to the British State'santi-CND campaign through two IEDSS Council members: Conservative MP RayWhitney and senior Tory Sir Peter Blaker - an old friend of Crozier's fromCambodian days (401). Sir Peter Blaker served as a junior Minister in the Ministry ofDefence from 1979 to 1983 when Defence Minister Michael Heseltine appointed himto head a secret Ministerial Group on Nuclear Weapons and Public Opinion. ThisMinisterial Group led to the creation of Defence Secretariat DS19, an MoD groupwhich generated films and literature attacking the Campaign for NuclearDisarmament. This official but clandestine campaign by Heseltine and Blaker wasassisted by Conservative MP Ray Whitney, who served with Blaker on the IEDSSBoard from 1979 to 1984.Whitney had previously had considerable experience in black propaganda;prior to being elected to Parliament and becoming a junior Minister under MrsThatcher, Whitney was the last head of IRD before it was officially "closed down" inApril 1977; like many other IRD staff, he would then transfer to the IRD's "purged"successor, the Overseas Information Department. After releasing a letter purportingto prove communist domination of CND and the Labour Party, Heseltine commented:"Our colleague Ray Whitney has added a valuable contribution to our knowledge ofthe political motivations of CND". The IEDSS allowed Blaker, Whitney and the MoDteam to recycle their anti-unilateralist propaganda under the guise of "academicrespectability"; one such IEDSS publication was Perception and Reality - An OpinionPoll on Defence and Disarmament, published in 1985 and written by Blaker togetherwith Sir Clive Rose, former deputy secretary in the Cabinet Office from 1976 to1979 - another old ISC friend. The IEDSS later promoted the disinformation themethat the Soviet special forces spetsnaz used women peace-campers as cover toreconnoitre the Greenham Common Cruise missile base (402).The IEDSS's anti-CND campaign was supported on an altogether more viciouslevel by another Heritage beneficiary, the Coalition for Peace through Security.The CPS was founded in the autumn of 1981; the Heritage Foundation's tax returnsshow a 1982 donation of $10,000 to the CPS, and a letter from CPS to theFoundation thanks it for a further contribution of $50,000 in October of the sameyear. The general coordinator appointed by Thatcher for the Government's attack onCND was Winston Churchill MP, a FARI member alongside Chalfont and the Cercletrio of Crozier, Moss and Amery; the CPS shared offices with FARI. The CPS enjoyedclose links to the Conservative Party Central Office - the three directors of the CPSwere all prospective Conservative parliamentary candidates. Immediately after itsfoundation in 1981, the CPS obtained the list of Conservative Party agents aroundthe country and was given free access to the Party's mainframe computer. One of itsearliest actions was to set about infiltrating CND so as to gain access to its 1982annual conference; this was the beginning of a savage smear campaign, runningslogans such as "CND = KGB" and "Communist Neutralist Defeatist". In one typicalaction in August 1986, CPS activists disrupted a two minute silence commemoratingHiroshima by playing the national anthem full-blast over a loudspeaker system.The main CPS activist was "a gifted young man named Julian Lewis.Introduced to me by Norris McWhirter, Dr Lewis became the 6I's leading activist inBritain, notably as the scourge of [CND leader] Monsignor Bruce Kent and theCampaign for Nuclear Disarmament ... in Britain, the energetic Julian Lewis and hisyoung assistants wrote letters to the press, hired light aircraft trailing anti-CNDslogans, organised counter-demonstrations, and challenged Bruce Kent and otherspeakers at CND rallies. Books, pamphlets, folders, posters were produced, all ofthem pithy and telling " (403).Lewis would go on to run other anti-Left operations for the Cercle complexthroughout the 1980s, one of which would be the Media Monitoring Unit, foundedby the Conservative Central Office in 1985, a re-run of the ISC's 1970s actionsagainst leftist infiltration of the media. To raise funds for the MMU, Lewis would callon Cercle member Sir Peter Tennant: "The Media Monitoring Unit was conceived andcreated last year by a small group of self-described Right-of-centre political activists.The driving force is Julian Lewis ... He runs a political pressure group called PolicyResearch Associates which pops up now and again in debates on such matters ascouncil corruption, trade union law and CND [all Crozier campaigns]. Lord Chalfontis a patron as is Norris McWhirter, who founded the Freedom Association, andEdward Leigh, MP ... The increasing activity of the PRA and the decision to form themonitoring unit is indicative of a more aggressive approach in Right-of-centre circlesto getting across its message... To get the unit off the ground he approached SirPeter Tennant, 75, a senior City businessman and adviser to the CBI. Tennant inturn drew together a nucleus of sympathisers, mostly from the City, who put up the£25,000-or-so to hire a director, buy a video recorder and publish the report".Crozier recounts: "We produced several occasional issues of the Monitoring Report, animpressively researched survey of the political attitudes in the media, which showed,in my view beyond doubt, that there was a predominantly left-wing bias, especiallyin television. The first yearly report, at the end of 1986, attracted much pressattention, most of it favourable" (404).The Heritage Foundation also provided funds for another group, theInternational Freedom Fund Establishment, which acted as a clearing-house andconduit for Heritage Foundation funding of other groups. The IFFE was run by BrianCrozier, who thus became the Heritage Foundation's bag-man in Britain. IRS taxreturns for the Heritage Foundation show that it donated a total of $140,000 to theIFFE for the three years 1982, 1983 and 1985. In an interview, Heritage Vice-President Herb Berkowitz described the IFFE as "a networking operation .. wesupport them and he [Crozier] does the work" and admitted to a further Heritagedonation to Crozier of $50,000 in 1986 (405). Crozier himself said that the IFFEreceived a total of £200,000 from the Heritage Foundation between 1982 and 1986,whilst declining to identify the ultimate beneficiaries of such largesse (406).Many of these groups produced anti-CND publications; in 1982, the post-Crozier ISC brought out a Conflict Study entitled Political Violence and CivilDisobedience in Western Europe, whilst Crozier himself put together a 1984anthology, This War Called Peace, published by his Sherwood Press. The major anti-CND publication by the Cercle/6I complex would however be "Peace" of the Dead byPaul Mercer, "one of the best of our activists" according to Crozier. The massive 400-page book, "an exhaustive and authoritative analysis of the CND and its affiliates",was published in 1986 by Lewis's Policy Research Publications. The book's tone wasset by the cover illustration of the CND symbol cut through the middle by a hammerand sickle; joining Mercer in his exhaustive efforts to prove Moscow's domination ofCND were the Coalition for Peace through Security, the Freedom Association, BrianCrozier, Lord Chalfont (who contributed the foreword), John Rees and Peter Shipley,whose Conflict Study, Patterns of Protest in Western Europe, would also be publishedin 1986.Whilst Crozier and the London groups kept up the propaganda barrageagainst CND, they would also be active in giving practical assistance to pro-Cruisegroups in Holland. When the operation was launched in 1983, Holland was a keycountry, being the only NATO member government holding out against thedeployment of Cruise; it was only in 1985 that the Dutch government reluctantlyaccepted the principle of Cruise, and deployment itself did not start until 1987. Anumber of groups were set up in Holland to support deployment, using the sametactic as in the UK of accusing the largely Church-based Dutch peace movement ofbeing Soviet-controlled. Crozier states that the Dutch group"that was proving themost useful in countering the Soviet-led campaign was the Stichting Vrijheid,Vrede en Verdediging (Freedom, Peace and Defence Foundation)" (407).According to a Guardian report in 1987, the ISC acted as a channel for covertAmerican funding to certain Dutch pro-Cruise groups. Frank Brenchley, ex-GCHQand a former Chairman of the ISC Council (408), told the Guardian that the ISCproduced a private, unpublished report on the Dutch peace movement. Sir CliveRose acknowledged using ISC information on Holland when writing his book,Campaign against Western Defence. The research was carried out, he said, by twoISC members, Professor Leonard Schapiro and Nigel Clive, the latter a former head ofthe IRD. Michael Goodwin, ISC Director since Crozier's departure in 1979 and also aformer IRD member, confirmed that Holland was of particular interest to the ISC in1983 (409). The Dutch peace movement was evidently a focus for the CIA as well;besides the ISC propaganda operation to counter the Dutch peace movement in1983, the BVD and CIA infiltrated an agent provocateur amongst Dutch and Belgianpeace-campers in early 1984 in an attempt to compromise them in the theft of liveammunition from the Belgian Cruise base at Florennes; the ammunition was laterrecovered near the peace-camp at the Dutch Cruise base of Woensdrecht (410).Although the British-based campaign may have been the most intensive, theCercle complex also set up several European institutes specializing in antidisarmamentpropaganda. In his memoirs, Crozier records Cercle cooperation withtwo existing groups, the German Bonner Friedensforum (Bonn Peace Forum) and theFrench Comité Français contre le Neutralisme, as well as the creation of a BelgianCercle front group, the Rassemblement pour la Paix dans la Liberté (Rally forPeace in Freedom), whose "influence spread not only through the BelgianParliament, but into the schools, with the distribution of officially approved bookletson defence" (411).However, Crozier's account omits any mention of several other European antidisarmamentgroups with links to the Cercle. One was the Europäisches Institutfür Sicherheitsfragen (European Institute for Security Issues), founded in 1981 byBelgian General Robert Close, who had resigned from military service a yearpreviously in protest at the Belgian government's reluctance to accept Cruisedeployment (412). Founding members of the EIS were:General Robert Close Vice-President of MAUE from 1980 on;Belgian Senator for the PRL conservativeparty from 1981 to 1987; World President ofWACL in 1983-84; West European UnionVice-President from 1986 on; President ofWestern Goals Belgium; frequentResistance International signatory.Archduke Otto von HabsburgMartin Bangemann Chairman of German Liberal FDP Party,Finance Minister, later Vice-President of theEEC Commission.Gerhard Reddemann CDU MP.Hans Filbinger CDU former Regional Prime Minister ofBaden-Württemberg; PEU Council;Brüsewitz Centre; Ludwig-Frank-Stiftung.former Maj-Gen Jochen Löser Western Goals.former Gen Wolfgang Schall CDU MEP from 1979 to 1984; leader ofGerman WACL delegation from 1981 on.former Gen Kielmannsegg Former NATO Commander of CentralEurope; Board of the magazine Beiträge zurKonfliktforschung – Psychopolitische Aspekte(Contributions to the Study of Conflict –Psychopolitical Aspects, founded in 1971and funded by the Federal DefenceMinistry. Took free trips to South Africa in1971 and 1975.former Col Josef GoblirschLt-Col Gerhard Hubatscheck speaker for Grau's SWG.Kai-Uwe von Hassel CDU former Regional Prime Minister ofSchleswig-Holstein; former DefenceMinister; former President and Vice-President of the German Parliament until1976. Attended AESP Grand DînerCharlemagne in January 1976. Vice-President of the Council of EuropeParliamentary Assembly in 1977. Presidentof the WEU Assembly from 1977 to 1979.CDU MEP from 1979 to 1984. ResistanceInternational signatory, visited US to lobbyCongress to support Contras as part of RIdelegation. Participant with Huyn at secretmeeting on 8-10/6/87 on "The Future ofGerman-American Relations", organized byInternational Security Council, a groupwithin the Moonies' political arm, CAUSA.Died in 1997.Leo Tindermanns former Belgian Prime Minister, ForeignMinister in 1985.former Gen Pierre Cremer Belgium.Pierre Pflimlin Bilderberg Group, President of theEuropean Parliament in 1985, longstandingsupporter of PEU.The first conference of the EIS, held in the Belgian Foreign Ministry's palace,concentrated on how to promote NATO against peace movement opposition. InMarch 1982, the EIS Board expanded to include a number of new members, severalof whom would attend the second EIS conference in Luxembourg in April 1982:Franz Josef StraussGerhard Löwenthal ZDF; President of the Deutschland-Stiftungfrom 1977 to 1994; Brüsewitz Centre;Bürgeraktion Demokraten für Strauss;Konservative Aktion; ResistanceInternational; WACL; CAUSA.Dr. Heinrich Aigner CSU MEP from 1979 to 1988; Vice-President of the German PEU section;Brüsewitz Centre; Ludwig-Frank-Stiftung.former Brig-Gen Heinz Karst ISP; Deutschland-Stiftung; BrüsewitzCentre; Konservative Aktion.Alfons Goppel former Regional Prime Minister of Bavaria,CSU MEP from 1979 to 1984, Boardmember of PEU.former General Rall Chief of the German Air Force until August1974, then German representative to theMilitary Council of NATO. In October 1974,took a free trip to South Africa, sponsoredby the South Africa Foundation, touring thePelindaba nuclear research site. Exposureof the visit in September 1975 led to greatpublic controversy. A stalwart defender ofSouth African interests in Germany.Dr Ludwig Bölkow Bilderberg Group, Managing Director ofMesserschmitt Bölkow Blohn, the majorarmaments company (Strauss sat on theMBB Board), prominent CSU member andlinked to Starfighter scandal with Strauss,named President of NATO armsstandardization committee in 1976.Nicolas Estgens Luxemburg, MEP, former Vice-President ofEuropean Parliament, member of Bureau ofthe European Parliament conservativefraction EPP with Archduke Otto, served onPEU International Council from 1984 on.In 1983, the EIS split because of policy differences, and Close left to found theBrussels-based Institut Européen pour la Paix et la Sécurité (IEPS), perhaps aremoulding of the earlier Cercle group in Belgium, the Rassemblement pour la Paixdans la Liberté. The IEPS would also be well-connected to the Cercle complex:besides Close's rôle as MAUE Vice-President, other IEPS members included JacquesJonet, also a MAUE Vice-President, Crozier and Huyn. Within the IEPS, the HeritageFoundation and ASC were represented by Generals Robert Richardson and Daniel O.Graham, both members of the Political Action Committee of the ASC involved in theanti-Carter campaign of 1980. One IEPS Vice-President was Wolfgang Reineckefrom Germany, a speaker for Grau’s Swiss ISP in 1975 and member of theInternational Institute for Strategic Studies in London. The IEPS administrator wasBelgian Colonel Henri Bernard, former history lecturer at the Belgian MilitarySchool. Bernard had been one of Damman's earliest partners, serving as a speakerfor the Belgian PEU section in the early 1960s when it was still called AENA;Bernard was also a longstanding CEDI member. Other IEPS luminaries includedIEPS Vice-President Belgian Count Yves du Monceau de Bergendal, a PSC senatorand supporter of Opus Dei, the former Belgian Justice Minister during the strategyof tension Jean Gol, EEC Commissioner Willy Declercq and prominent figures fromthe Belgian French-speaking Liberal Party, the PRL (413).The Cercle Pinay also had a presence in several other anti-disarmamentpropaganda institutes. Key Cercle and 6I member Huyn was a Board member of theAmerican European Strategy Research Institute (AESRI), an offshoot of theGerman section of Western Goals, founded in 1981 (414). A meeting to discusssetting up a German section of Western Goals was held in Bonn on 17th May 1981,attended by Huyn, Hans Klein of the Brüsewitz Centre and the Deutschland-Stiftung, former Admiral Poser (former head of NATO Security and Intelligence), EISmember former Major-General Jochen Löser, Carl-Gustav Ströhm of the newspaperDie Welt, Larry McDonald of the John Birch Society, and former Generals GeorgePatton and Lewis Walt. Larry McDonald put up $131,982 starting capital. WesternGoals Europe and AESRI were then founded in Munich on 8th July 1981 by Huyn,Klein, McDonald, Patton, CDU MP Helmut Sauer, BND agent Stefan Marinoff andAmerican industrialist Robert Stoodard. AESRI had branches in Heidelberg, Bonnand Munich.In May 1982, AESRI member Huyn aroused a media storm with a publicationentitled Für Frieden in Freiheit (For Peace with Freedom), which "documented" theKGB's control of the peace movement and returned to an old theme, Sovietsubversion in the Churches. Huyn's conclusions would also be reported in theDutch daily, De Telegraaf as well as other European and American newspapers(415). Another frequent writer for AESRI and Western Goals Europe was ProfessorHans-Werner Bracht, the former senior lecturer at the Army School for PsychologicalWarfare who had worked with Löwenthal in the Deutschland-Stiftung, the BrüsewitzCentre and Konservative Aktion. Bracht would serve on the Western Goals EuropeBoard from 1983 on before becoming its President.One main transatlantic relay in the propaganda chorus was of course theNSIC; another significant US strategy group with links to the Cercle was the ASCand its main operational arm, the Coalition for Peace through Strength, one of themost vocal anti-disarmament groups in the 1980s. The ASC had links to the Cerclecomplex through five ASC Board Members:Gen. Richard G. Stilwell attended the January 1980 Cercle/6I meeting, senior 6Imember;Gen. Daniel O. Graham ASC/Heritage representative on IEPS Board in 1983;Gen. Robert Richardson ASC/Heritage representative on IEPS Board in 1983;Gen. Lewis Walt founding member of Western Goals Germany in 1981;Adm. John S. McCain 1974 launch of Centre du Monde Moderne; Boardmember of US Committee for the ISC (416).Generals Stilwell and Graham also ensured Cercle access to the Moonies'CAUSA and their American geostrategic propaganda outlet, the US Global StrategyCouncil (USGSC), the two Generals serving on the Board with Pipes under theChairmanship of Ray Cline in the late 1980s. Graham was also Vice-President of theAmerican branch of WACL and held posts on honorary committees of the AmericanFriends of the Anti-Bolshevik Bloc of Nations (417).SMEAR!As we have seen, the Cercle complex could use its international links tointelligence-backed private disinformation outlets to intervene in each country'sdomestic politics by promoting their favoured political candidate, and by accusingpoliticians or movements of the Left or Centre of being Soviet dupes or stooges.Crozier's 1979 Transnational Security planning paper bluntly stated that one of thefunctions of the group was to "conduct international campaigns aiming to discredithostile personalities and\or events". In the late 1980s, it emerged that quite apartfrom the energetic 6I staff, Crozier could count on other friends to smear the Left.After Thatcher's election victory in 1979 and her subsequent working meetingat Chequers with MI6 chief Franks and the 6I team of Crozier and Elliott, the UKcounter-subversion lobby's smear campaign against the Labour Party continuedright through the 1980s with scarcely an interruption. In 1988, it emerged thatBrian Crozier had been working with Charles Elwell, former head of MI5's F orInternal Subversion Branch, and with Peter Wright one of the MI5 officers mostclosely connected with the Frolik allegations central to the anti-Labour campaigns of1974-76 (418). Elwell had later been a major factor in MI5's decision in the mid- tolate 1970s to shift operations away from counter-espionage towards countersubversion,strengthening MI5's rôle as a political police. It was Elwell, for instance,in his capacity as Assistant Director of MI5, who defined the National Council of CivilLiberties as a "subversive organization", allowing blanket surveillance that blew upinto a national scandal after revelations made by Elwell's former subordinate, CathyMassiter, in 1985.In the late 1970s, Elwell set up a special unit within MI5 to produce a reporton "subversion and left-wing bias in the media". The unit investigated journalistsjudged to hold anti-establishment views as well as those appointed to what MI5considered politically sensitive or influential posts – at this time, MI5 was vetting allBBC News and Drama staff from an office in the BBC's Broadcasting House,stamping suspect journalists' personnel files with a Christmas tree symbol. AlthoughElwell's MI5 media monitoring unit was disbanded a few years later, MI5 held on toits files – or maybe not too tightly, bearing in mind the ISC Study Group onsubversion in the media which met from May 1977 to April 1978 and whichpublished its findings as an ISC Special Report, Television and Conflict, in November1978.Soon after his retirement from MI5 in 1982, Elwell started producing a secretsmear bulletin called Background Briefing on Subversion, revealed by theGuardian in late 1989. Elwell's newsletter targeted many of the same politicians andreproduced many of the same smears as MI5's previous "Clockwork Orange 2"operation (419). Despite parliamentary questions, it was not until late 1990 thatfurther details of the smear bulletin were published in the Observer (420), whichreported that the bulletin, later called British Briefing, was assisted for much of itsexistence by Brian Crozier.Available only to a select few, and containing strict warnings not to reveal itsexistence, the bulletin accused many prominent Labour politicians of Communist orStalinist affiliations. Amongst the targets were Neil Kinnock, shadow health secretaryRobin Cook, social services spokesman Michael Meacher, and Labour MPs HarrietHarman (a previous MI5 target during her spell at the NCCL), Harry Cohen, ChrisMullin, Harry Barnes and David Blunkett. Several progressive organizations werealso tarred with the Communist brush, notably the housing charity Shelter, theInstitute for Race Relations and the World Council of Churches. All were smeared byassociation using quotations from left-wing newspapers such as the Morning Star –exactly the tactic that the ISC and 6I used, thanks to their research libraries.The bulletin, usually 35 pages long, brought out two special General Electionsupplements in March and April, 1987: the March supplement, 29 pages long,contained smears on nearly 50 candidates. The tone of British Briefing can be judgedby the following declaration in the February, 1987 issue:"The march of communism through the trades unions, the Labour Party, localgovernment, religion, education, charity, the media under the leadership ofcommunists who may or may not be members of the Communist Party, iswhat BB is all about. BB seeks to provide those who have the means toexpose the communist threat with clear evidence of its existence."Funding for the smear operation came through a registered charity, theIndustrial Trust, financed by many of the UK's leading companies (421). Publishingwas carried out at the address of IRIS, Industrial Research and Information Services,one of the right-wing blacklisting services which published its own newsletter, IRISNews, aimed at a trade-union audience. The Industrial Trust's accounts showed thatsince 1985 the Industrial Trust also had given more than half a million pounds toIRIS, as well as £5,000 a year to Common Cause (422). The Trust would later beinvestigated by the Charities Commission for possible breaches of the ban onpolitical activity by charities. Further funding for British Briefing came from mediamagnate Rupert Murdoch, who provided some £40,000 a year for Elwell's smearsheet. An old friend of Crozier's, Murdoch also bailed out Crozier's publishingcompany, Sherwood Press, which by 1987 had accumulated a deficit of £65,000.Murdoch's News International took a half-stake in the company and agreed to meetlosses then totalling over £90,000. Crozier also had legal costs to pay after losing alibel case brought by Richard Barnet, director of the Institute for Policy Studies(423).Perhaps because of this considerable financial strain, publication of BritishBriefing was taken over in 1988 by David Hart, a close aide to Mrs Thatcher. From1977 to 1981, Hart had been research assistant to Archie Hamilton, the man who,as Minister of State for the Armed Forces, had to bear the fall-out from the ColinWallace case. In 1979, Hart worked as campaign organizer for the Corby andKettering election campaigns of Rupert Allason, Tory MP for Torbay - alias NigelWest, the spooks' favoured historian. In 1984, during the strike by the NationalUnion of Mineworkers, Hart made media fame by setting up the Working Miners'Committee from a suite in Claridges. Hart also set up the Committee for a FreeBritain, which ran newspaper adverts during the 1987 election. In 1986, Hartapplied to Tory Central Office to become a candidate for the 1987 general election;despite having powerful sponsors (Malcolm Rifkind, Transport Secretary, LordYoung, later Tory Party chairman, and Ian Gow, Thatcher's private secretary for herfirst four years in office), he was turned down. Besides his intelligence links inBritain, Hart had contacts in the US: CIA director Bill Casey used Hart to run a UKcampaign in favour of Star Wars, and Hart was also friends with Fred Ickle, formerNo 2 at the Pentagon (424). Hart would also finance anti-CND propaganda by LadyOlga Maitland to counter a demonstration against the first Iraq War on February2nd, 1991.THE "TERRORIST THREAT"By the late 1980s, the focus for scare tactics by the disinformation instituteshad shifted from Moscow manipulation of the peace movement to Soviet backing forinternational terrorism. The Cercle's London partner, the ISC, had carried out muchof the early propaganda work on terrorism, providing consultancy services intraining for the police and armed services. One of the right-wing academics wholectured at police colleges in the early 1970s at the suggestion of the ISC wasProfessor Paul Wilkinson, who went on to cut his propaganda teeth with ISC ConflictStudy No. 67, Terrorism versus Liberal Democracy: The Problem of Response,published in January 1976. Two months later, in March 1976, with Crozier, Mossand Horchem, Wilkinson would be one of four ISC speakers at a major internationalconference on terrorism in Washington, chaired by Robert Fearey. In 1979, the sameISC team attended two Israeli conferences on terrorism, the first organised by theIsraeli Jaffee Centre for Strategic Studies, where Wilkinson was accompanied byMoss and Horchem (425). The second Israeli conference was in July in Jerusalem atthe founding conference of the probable Mossad front, the Jonathan Institute, amajor gathering of Cercle assets. At the Jonathan Institute's launch, speakersincluded not only the ISC team of Crozier, Moss, Wilkinson and Horchem, but alsoex-CIA chief George H. W. Bush, Ray Cline, Lord Chalfont, Jacques Soustelle andGerhard Löwenthal (426).Wilkinson, later professor at Aberdeen and St. Andrew's universities, rose tobecome a prominent adviser on terrorism to Margaret Thatcher; this is notsurprising when one looks at the Board members of Wilkinson's ResearchFoundation for the Study of Terrorism (427). The RFST, which operated from theaddress of Aims for Industry, included on its Board many figures from SIF, NAFF,FARI, the ISC and the Cercle complex:Michael Ivens Director of Aims, SIF National Executive with G. K.Young, FARI Council, NAFF National Executive and innercore with Moss, Vice-President of the FreedomAssociation.Norris McWhirter SIF, NAFF National Executive and inner core with Mossand Ivens, Chairman of the Freedom Association.Ian Greig Founding Monday Club member, Deputy Director ofFARI, Senior Executive of the ISC, probable early AESPcontact.John Biggs-Davison SIF National Executive with G. K. Young, FARI Council,Monday Club President, longstanding PEU Councilmember, AESP Life Member.Nicholas Elliott MI6, 6I/Cercle with Crozier.In 1989, the RFST merged with the rump of the post-Crozier ISC under thetitle of the Research Institute for the Study of Conflict and Terrorism (RISCT).Alongside Wilkinson as RISCT Director was RISCT's Chairman Frank Brenchley,former Chairman of the ISC Council, and RISCT Executive and Editorial DirectorProfessor William Gutteridge, an ISC author from 1971 onwards. RISCT offered forsale the whole series of Conflict Studies from 1970 onwards, and proclaimed itselfsuccessor to the ISC in its publication list:"The Research Institute for the Study of Conflict and Terrorism wasestablished in 1989, primarily to undertake research and publishing activities. Itcontinues to produce the well-established monthly series, Conflict Studies, begun in1970 by its predecessor, the Institute for the Study of Conflict".Besides Wilkinson and his RFST and RISCT, the Cercle and 6I also had linksto several other 'terrorism research' outfits in the 1980s and 1990s, of whichperhaps the most prominent was Control Risks Information Services. After leavingthe ISC, the Institute's Senior Researcher and South Africa expert Peter Jankebecame chief researcher at Control Risks, which also included Major-GeneralRichard Clutterbuck, a former Council member of the ISC, and Richard Sims, whohad been the ISC's librarian. Control Risks would continue the ISC's previousassistance to South Africa: in 1986, it set up a syndicate for British companiestrading with South Africa. For a price of £1,500 per place, Control Risks informedthe syndicate's members of "the activities of anti-apartheid groups in Europe, theirrelationship to terrorist groups and their intentions" (428).FARI would also provide the Cercle and 6I with connections to anotherterrorism disinformation outlet - besides serving on the Governing Council of FARIwith Crozier, Moss and Amery, Lord Chalfont also chaired the London Institute forthe Study of Terrorism run by Jillian Becker. Both Chalfont and Becker wereauthors for the IEDSS - Becker's contribution was typically entitled The SovietConnection - State Sponsorship of Terrorism. Moss himself then went on to run Mid-Atlantic Research Associates, a "risk analysis firm" together with Arnaud deBorchgrave and John Rees of the John Birch Society.A German terrorism propaganda outlet intimately linked with the Cerclecomplex and 6I was the Bonn-based Institut für Terrorismusforschung (Institutefor Terrorism Research), created in 1986 by Hans Josef 'Jupp' Horchem, formerDirector of the Hamburg BfV. In the mid-1970s, Horchem had been a prolific authorfor the ISC, joining Crozier's 6I soon after its creation in 1977. Together with Mossand Wilkinson, Horchem attended the two 1979 Israeli conferences on terrorismorganised by the Israeli Jaffee Centre for Strategic Studies and the JonathanInstitute. After taking early retirement in January 1981, Horchem became aResearch Fellow of the Centre for Strategic Studies in Tel Aviv and of the Institute forStrategic and International Studies at Georgetown University. He would also sign upwith the Axel Springer Verlag, the newspaper group which publishes both Die Weltand Bild, the newspaper with the largest circulation in Europe. Besides railingagainst communists and peace campaigners in Die Welt, Horchem also served asadviser to the "Internal Security Working Group" of Konservative Aktion, whose Vice-Chair was Löwenthal, another participant at the Jonathan Institute's launch in1979.In the mid 1980s, Horchem produced his fourth ISC Conflict Study, Terrorismin Germany, and also contributed sections on terrorism in Germany to publicationsby Wilkinson and Ariel Merari (429). Horchem's views were evidently in favour withhis previous employers: in 1987, a thousand copies each of two of his publicationswere bought by the BfV for purposes of "positive protection of the constitution byinformation work", i.e. propaganda (430). In July 1988, Horchem was one of theformer intelligence officers interviewed as part of the BBC Radio programmes on theintelligence services, My Country, Right or Wrong?, broadcast after the government'stemporary injunction banning the programme was lifted. The programmes alsofeatured two ex-CIA officers, fellow 6I member Jamie Jameson and Cercle guestWilliam Colby.A transatlantic outlet for Cercle output on terrorism would be provided by theCanadian Centre for Conflict Studies (CCS), founded in 1979 by BrigadierMaurice Tugwell, former head of the Northern Ireland black propaganda unit,Information Policy, and a participant in ISC Study Groups. Although CCS wasattached to the University of New Brunswick, it gave no academic courses and itsactivities consisted largely of contract work for the Royal Canadian Mounted Police,Canadian Police College, Canadian Department of National Defence, US Departmentof Defence, and NATO. The CCS would work with both the ISC and its successorRISCT; the editorial advisory board for the CCS quarterly journal, Conflict Quarterly,included Professor Paul Wilkinson. It would also collaborate with the AmericanNSIC, contributing a paper entitled Special Operations and the Threat to United StatesInterests in the 1980s to a 1984 study entitled Special Operations in US Strategycompiled by the NSIC for the US National Defense University. In 1988, thepublication of Combatting the Terrorists was announced, a book sponsored by theISC in London and the Washington office of the CCS. The book brought together oldfriends: the editor, H.H. Tucker, was a former Deputy Head of IRD, and the bookincluded a chapter by the ISC's Peter Janke. Tugwell combined his anti-Sovietdisinformation activities with pro-South African propaganda: he served as a directorof the Canada-South Africa Society, a pro-apartheid support group funded by SouthAfrican "businessmen". Tugwell would later found the Mackenzie Institute for theStudy of Terrorism, Revolution and Propaganda in the mid-1980s (431).CHANGES IN THE CERCLE AND 6IWhilst the Cercle and 6I could count on this panoply of friends to promote itsmessage throughout the 1980s, time had been taking its toll. By the mid-1980s,many of the people and the groups making up the Cercle complex in France,Belgium and Germany had disappeared. The Cercle's extensive operations had alsonot gone unnoticed by journalists, and the 1980s would see publication of the firstdamaging revelations of some Cercle activities.To turn first to the original French node of the Cercle Pinay complex, Violet'swithdrawal from the Cercle in the early 1980s (leaving it to Crozier and Bach) andAlbertini's death in 1983 had seriously weakened the operational French end of theCercle/6I. This would be compounded four days before Christmas 1983 by therevelation of the sniffer plane scandal by distinguished French journalist Pierre Péanin an article in Le Canard Enchainé, followed in 1984 by his book V (V for Violet,Villegas, Vatican, Vorster and Valéry Giscard d'Estaing), a comprehensive exposureof Violet, whose activities were highlighted by a French parliamentary inquiry intothe sniffer plane scandal.The AESP itself did not fare much better, riven by personality clashes afterDamman's death in 1979. The Cercle's attempts to revive their Belgian axis failed; in1983, the Cercle/6I's European anti-disarmament group EIS under General Closesplit, and its successor, the IEPS founded by Close, Crozier, Huyn and Jonet, wouldsoon become moribund. In 1984 came a further double blow: the death of core AESPmembers Carlo Pesenti, under investigation by the Italian financial authorities, andKarl-Friedrich Grau, who died in circumstances that matched his conspiratorialnature. After being arrested in Luxembourg following a fraud investigation intomovements of millions of marks deposited with Luxembourg banks, Grau faked amedical emergency and was transferred under police guard to a hospital; he brokehis neck whilst jumping out of a window trying to escape (432). The same year, thepublication of Péan's book on Violet and the AESP would not be the only exposure ofthe Cercle's activities; Crozier also records being confronted with the Langemannpapers in French translation during a visit to a Belgian Atlantic Association meetingin October 1984 (433).Whilst the French-speaking axis of the Cercle was lamed by exposure andofficial investigations in three countries, the German and Swiss components of theCercle complex also suffered setbacks. Grau's death seriously handicapped thenetwork of groups he had established in Germany and Switzerland. The complex'sother German associates, Löwenthal and Pachmann, also ran into difficulties;following a split within Konservative Aktion, KA filed for bankruptcy in September1986. The following year, Löwenthal's unrivaled media access as moderator of ZDFMagazin also came to an end; long uncomfortable with the controversy generated byhis programme, the ZDF management took the opportunity of Löwenthal's 65thbirthday to force him into retirement and to discontinue ZDF Magazin in December1987. The Cercle's political frontman Franz Josef Strauss then died in October 1988.The Cercle, and particularly the 6I, would increasingly rely on Huyn and Horchemfor their German outreach.The British axis of the Cercle complex also underwent changes in the 1980s.As the French and Belgian connections declined, the Cercle and the 6I parted ways.With funding in the early 1980s, first from Casey's CIA and then from the HeritageFoundation, Crozier could rejuvenate the 6I network by hiring several youngactivists (notably Julian Lewis and Edward Leigh) to run the 6I's anti-CND and anti-Labour campaigns in the UK. This was, Crozier says, the 6I's peak period ofoperations; due to the intense activity, Crozier withdrew from the Cercle in 1985,leaving it to continue as a bi-annual talking-shop under the Chairmanship of JulianAmery. Two other British bodies associated with the Cercle complex would soon shutdown: both FARI and the FAPC would be wound down in 1986. According to Crozier,the 6I was then going through a funding crisis; although new sources of funds wouldbe found, Crozier, now seventy, decided that "it was time to pull back and handover". Having "paid off all the 6I's agents, mainly in Britain, France, Belgium,Germany, Holland, Spain, Portugal and the United States", Crozier records shuttingdown the 6I in the late summer of 1987 (434). However, Crozier's claims to have leftthe Cercle in 1985 and to have shut down the 6I in 1987 need to be treated withscepticism, as we will see below.GLASNOST - SOVIET PROPAGANDABy mid-1988, Crozier was concentrating on a new campaign against MikhailGorbachev "as a necessary corrective to the wave of adulation about the Sovietleader at that time sweeping the West. My prime discovery was that Gorbachev's firstconcern was not ... the 'restructuring' of the Soviet economy and Party organisation,but of the entire apparatus of disinformation and other Active Measures. My aim wasto present, in factual detail, the Soviet involvement – since Gorbachev's advent tosupreme power – in 'peace' disinformation, including forgeries, in internationalterrorism and drugs-running, in penetration of the Western Churches, and indeliberate cheating in arms control negotiations" (435).Crozier's claims to have withdrawn from the Cercle in 1985 and to have shutdown 6I in late 1987 are belied by the minutes of a Cercle meeting held on 21stFebruary 1989 and continued in Washington on 10th April. The February meetingwas attended by Pinay, Crozier, Cercle Chairman Amery, Huyn, Barnett of theNSIC/WISC, Charlie Mayer of the Foreign Policy Discussion Group, P.K. van Byl, aformer senior BOSS agent, and a certain Professor Theodor Bach. The main themeon the agenda for the British, German, American and South African veteranoperators was "What can be done to contain the pro-Gorbachev mood in the FederalRepublic?" The minutes of the meeting reveal that one item discussed was acampaign to discredit German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher from theLiberal FDP party."The problem:Genscher's power is unbroken. He determines Bonn's foreign policy, eventhough he has been responsible for it for 14 years and makes the Chancellordependent on the FDP.- the weakness of Kohl, the great appeaser,- the popularity of Gorbachev in public opinion in the Federal Republic,- the media.Possible methods:- in the Federal Parliament? Support from Alfred Dregger [Leader of theCDU\CSU group]? Support from Otto Lambsdorff?- Can Genscher be discredited? Certainly there is enough 'dirt' available.- Have we got any allies in the media? Horchem? Die Welt?- Is all of West German television contaminated?- Outside of Parliament (extra-parliamentary action). Can we use the BonnPeace Forum? (436) Possible themes or slogans for demonstrations: Stop Rearmamentin the USSR; don't pay Gorbachev's bills,- Diplomatic pressure, particularly through the new US ambassador, DickWalters (437),- A comment: the modernization of weapons (Lance) is relatively insignificant.The most important problem is the general atmosphere of a policy ofreconciliation" (438).But even as the 6I was preparing to intensify its anti-Gorbachev campaign, itwould be overtaken by events on the ground; 1989 would bring the long-awaitedcollapse of the Iron Curtain with the fall of the Berlin Wall on the 9th-10thNovember. The fall of the Wall was however only the final act in a seven-monthprocess in which Habsburg and the PEU played a prominent part. The process hadstarted within weeks of the Cercle/6I meetings in February and April - on 2nd May1989, when Hungarian border guards began dismantling the watch-towers on theAustro-Hungarian border, an act officialised on 27th June when the ForeignMinisters of Austria and Hungary, Alois Mock and Gyula Horn respectively,personally cut the border fence near the Hungarian town of Sopron.The PEU then obtained 'official permission' to hold a "Paneuropean Picnic" onthe same spot on August 19th under the combined patronage of Hungarian ministerImre Pozsgay and Otto von Habsburg of the PEU, to open – for three hours - theborder gate sealing the old Pressburg (Bratislava) highway between SanktMargarethen in Austria and Sopronköhida in Hungary. The PEU ensured advancepublicity for this 'peace demonstration' as far as Poland, particularly targetting theannual crowd of East German holiday-makers. On the day, Habsburg's daughterWalburga symbolically cut the barbed wire fence, the gate was opened, and 661 EastGermans crossed into the West whilst the Hungarian border guards observedwithout intervening.Despite an immediate crackdown on border security by the Hungariangovernment, the writing was on the wall; the Austro-Hungarian border would befully opened for East Germans on September 11th, followed by the Czechoslovak-German border in the first few days of November. Faced with massive numbers ofEast Germans preparing to use these breaches, the East German government waspowerless to prevent the fall of the Berlin Wall.Whilst the PEU had been working on bilateral contacts with EasternEuropean countries, notably through the European Parliament where Habsburgand Pirkl held powerful posts on the Delegations for Relations with both Austriaand Hungary, the Cercle/6I group continued to gun for the Soviet leader, trying todampen the West's enthusiasm for glasnost and perestroika.Despite Crozier's claim to have closed down the 6I in late 1987, the networkstill existed "with old and new outlets in New York, Washington, Paris, Madrid andother places" (439). Although not all of these outlets can yet be identified, themention of Paris referred to a relaunch of the Cercle/6I's outreach in the Frenchspeakingworld. The new forum, the Institut d'Etudes de la Désinformation (IED)with headquarters on the Champs Elysées, held its "First International Assizes onDisinformation" in Nice from the 13th to 16th November 1989 – barely four daysafter the fall of the Wall (440). According to the programme, the seminar was devotedto:"Day One - The new methods of seduction of the Communist countries:Gorbachevism, analysed from inside by true dissidents, a presentation of countriesgenerally targeted by Soviet disinformation, a study of all those who contribute,voluntarily or otherwise, to this disinformation by acting as its channels in the West;Day Two - The rôle of the State: the omnipotent State which exerts an ideologicaldomination over its essential bodies such as the Army, the police or the judiciary ..analysis of disinformation which presents capitalism, and not socialism, as acorrupting force and which wants social progress to be linked to Statism and agovernment of the Left;Day Three - Daily Disinformation: an analysis of the major fears which reject thevery idea of progress and cultural disinformation which ... contributes to thecorruption of our society leading to the collapse of the pillars of the State;Day Four - An insider's view of the French Press: having analysed different examplesof disinformation from the most varied fields, understanding the mechanisms whichmake such a phenomenon possible so as to act more efficiently at a later stage".Attended by numerous French academics and journalists, the seminar wasintroduced by the IED top brass - IED President Daniel Trinquet and then the hostas Mayor of Nice, former French minister and now editorial writer for the IED'sweekly bulletin Désinformation Hebdo, Jacques Médecin - an AESP member since1977.Alongside them as speakers, the 6I trio of Crozier, who as an "expert oninternational relations" spoke on "The myth of Gorbachevism: the difference betweenpromises and reality. Does the West want to be disinformed?", Huyn ("Sovietmethods of destabilization of Europe") and Horchem, "Director of the Bonn Institutefor the Study of Terrorism". The 6I brought along two friends as fellow speakers, oneAmerican and one English: General Richardson of the ASC and Heritage Foundationwho had served on the IEPS Board with Crozier and Huyn, and David Hart, "leaderwriter at the Times" who the previous year had taken over from Crozier as backer ofElwell's smear-sheet British Briefing.Three French speakers rounded off the list: Suzanne Labin, veteran leader ofthe French section of WACL, Prefect Jean Rochet, from 1967 to 1972 head of theFrench DST internal security service, and Joel-François Dumont, a seniorjournalist specializing in security and intelligence issues at the French FR3 regionaltelevision network (441).Of the three 6I speakers at these IED Assizes, Horchem had just produced thefirst contribution to the 6I's anti-Gorbachev campaign, his 1989 book Pro pace - derzweite Weg sowjetischer Aussenpolitik. Der Kampf des Kremls um Herzen und Hirne(Pro pace - the second path of Soviet foreign policy. The Kremlin's struggle for heartsand minds). Alongside Horchem as co-authors were Dr. Iain Elliott of the IEDSSBoard and Roy Godson of the NSIC’s Washington office. This book was then followedin 1990 by Huyn's Gorbachev's Operation: A Common European House - SovietStrategic Deception and Crozier's The Gorbachev Phenomenon: Peace and Secret War(442).The last sighting of the Cercle or the 6I covered by this investigation came inNovember 1991, when the 6I trio would turn up, again with Dumont, under adifferent guise - the International Freedom Foundation (IFF), about whichrelatively little is unknown. According to a 1995 Newsday article (443), the IFF wasfounded in 1986 and fronted by notorious American lobbyist Jack Abramoff, later tobe jailed for his corrupt relationship with several congressional legislators. With astaff of twenty under Chairman Duncan Sellars, the IFF operated from prestigiousoffices in Washington, lobbying Congress, organising high-profile conferences andaward ceremonies and publishing an extensive range of journals, reports andbriefing papers. With branches in London, Rome, Hamburg, Brussels andJohannesburg, the IFF's stated aims were that it "works to foster individual freedomthroughout the world" and "encourages and mobilizes support of indigenousdemocratic movements".In reality, the IFF's purpose was the exact opposite – to counteract pressurein the US for sanctions on South Africa by denigrating Nelson Mandela and the ANCas Soviet stooges. Over half the IFF's funding was provided by the South African DMI– the Directorate of Military Intelligence - which gave at least $1.5 million a year from1986 on (444). In 1992, President de Klerk would end DMI funding of the IFF as partof a withdrawal from 'Third Force' operations negotiated with Mandela; the IFF wouldclose down the following year.Before its closure, the IFF provided a platform for the 6I in the autumn of1991 by organising a series of three conferences on intelligence in Washington andin Potsdam; the proceedings would be published the following year by the IFF'sGerman branch (445) under the book title Intelligence and the New World Order. Thespeakers at the two Washington seminars, Assessing U.S. Intelligence Needs for the1990s: Congressional Oversight of the Intelligence Community – Finding the ProperBalance, included Romerstein, Holliday and Kraemer as well as CIA veterans GeorgeCarver and Theodore Shackley. Of greatest interest though was the third IFFintelligence conference, held in November 1991 in Potsdam under the title NationalIntelligence Agencies in the period of European Partnership.Hard by the Berlin Wall breached almost exactly two years earlier, the IFFvenue symbolized the changes since the fall of the Iron Curtain and Germanreunification, "closing the circle of the superpower era, at a conference in SchlossCecilienhof, Potsdam, where Stalin initiated the Cold War", as the IFF book put it.The two keynote speakers in Potsdam also reflected the meeting of East and West:General Oleg Kalugin, former head of KGB Counter-Intelligence, and William Colby,ex-Director of the CIA and a Cercle guest. Alongside them on the podium asspeakers were the 6I trio of Crozier, Huyn (446) and Horchem (447) together withtheir companion from the 1989 IED seminar, French security journalist Joel-François Dumont (448). Finally, amongst the participants at the IFF conference wasanother familiar face, Cercle/6I member Jamie Jameson. In new times, there'snothing like old friends.A CIRCLE OF FRIENDSIn contrast to the public conception of "conspiracy theory", the linksuncovered by parapolitical research are rarely lines of command. Parapoliticalactivity is not pyramidal like a government hierarchy; it is connective, a network ofnodes like a circle of friends. The links between the nodes are lines of supportarising not from a command structure, but from a community of interest, sharedobjectives and interlocking memberships. Individual groups do not so much set theagenda or run the show as act within their own sphere of influence or speciality,occasionally supporting actions taken by others. Many are isolated and have littleimpact outside their own country, and here the Cercle came into its own as a groupwith a world-wide agenda, connecting and, to some extent, coordinating theactivities of groups in many different countries. The Cercle complex stands almostalone as an active international network linking secret service veterans and theirmedia manipulators to top right-wing politicians. As to its significance, I can do nobetter than to quote Ramsay and Dorril:"One of the conclusions to be drawn from this essay is about networks. Onecommon response to the delineation of a network is to say, 'Yes, all that isinteresting, but where is the actual transmission of power?' To which wewould argue - and this is the only claim we make which might be calledtheoretical - that the network is the power. A network of people who are,elsewhere, powerful, is per se a powerful network."Through its network of private-sector spies and their disinformation outlets,the Cercle complex could promote or denigrate public figures not only in their owncountry, but throughout Europe and America. Its activities - covert funding, blackpropaganda, smear campaigns and, at least, connections to planned coups d'état -were those of any intelligence agency, and, in many ways, that is what the Cerclecomplex has been: the rogue agents of the international Right.FOOTNOTES(1) Crozier, pg 191.(2) The major source on Habsburg and the Paneuropean Union is the YoungEuropean Federalists. Quite apart from Habsburg's political credentials, he was, asheir to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the last in the line fromCharlemagne, ruler of the first Holy Roman Empire, whose seal would be the symbolof the AESP. The first Holy Roman Empire, founded in 800 AD, covered more or lessthe same territory as the original EEC, created in 1957. Charlemagne's Holy RomanEmpire was, of course the First Reich, Kaiser Wilhelm's the Second, and Hitler's theThird. Habsburg had to renounce his claim to the Imperial and Regal Throne (KuK)to be allowed back into Austria after the war. Nonetheless, as nominal heir toAustro-Hungary, Habsburg was Opus Dei's candidate for the European Catholicthrone; Pinay and Violet were staunch supporters of Opus Dei, as were manymembers of the Cercle complex. This essay does not attempt to cover the vast field ofthe Catholic Right, Opus Dei and the Vatican - the lack of references here to thesegroups is certainly no indication of a lack of Cercle-Opus Dei connections. For arevealing account of Opus Dei's contacts in Belgium and with the AESP, see VanBosbeke.(3) With his seat in Pöcking just south of Munich, Habsburg has acted throughpost-war German history as the elder statesman of the Christian Social Union (CSU),the conservative party in the independence-minded Free State of Bavaria, anessential German Federal coalition partner of the CDU. Despite hosting the post-warnegotiations to create the Federal Republic of Germany, Bavaria would never sign itsfounding act, agreeing only to abide by it. Already a citizen of Austria, Hungary andCroatia, Habsburg would controversially receive dual [sic] German nationality in1978, just in time for him to be elected to the European Parliament as a CSU MEP inJune 1979 – at that time, Austria and Hungary were not EU members. For the nexttwenty years, Habsburg would sit in the European Parliament, notably chairing orco-chairing the Delegation on Relations with Hungary from 1989 to 1999, by whichtime Hungary's accession to the EU was assured. He would later play a significantpart in creating the first breach in the Iron Curtain ... between Austria and Hungary- see below on the Paneuropean Picnic.(4) An account of CEDI and biographic details on Habsburg can be found inIGfM, pgs 59-60, 75-76 - an outstanding piece of research on the internationalRight; for a full biography, see Young European Federalists.(5) Walsh, pg 66.(6) The post of Minister for Information and Tourism filled by Fraga Iribarne andSanchez Bella was a significant one; the Ministry of Information was responsible notonly for government communications but also for the licensing and censorship of themedia, whilst the Ministry of Tourism's sizable budget gave the Minister considerablelatitude for funding foreign contacts. Sanchez Bella died in 1999.(7) Braden was replaced as head of the CIA's IOD by Cord Meyer in 1954, whenMeyer took over responsibility for the CIA's clandestine funding of the EM and EYC,and later FWF.(8) On the early relationship between the two complexes, see Young EuropeanFederalists and Retinger pgs 209-216; on CIA funding of the EM and EYC, see TheEuropean Movement 1945-1953, F. X. Rebattet (son of the EM Secretary-GeneralGeorges-Louis Rebattet), unpublished thesis, Oxford University, 1962; Eringer pgs19-21; The CIA backs the Common Market, Steve Weissman, Phil Kelly and MarkHosenball, and How CIA money took the teeth out of British Socialism, RichardFletcher, both published in Dirtywork 1: The CIA in Western Europe, various authors.(9) Van Doorslaer and Verhoeyen, pgs 149-150.(10) A major source, not fully integrated here, is the exhaustive - and exhausting -sanitized book by Saunders, which refers to Forum World Features only in passingand makes no mention at all of Crozier.(11) Since March 1952.(12) On the Bilderberg Group, see Retinger; Eringer; Gonsalez-Mata. Gonsalez-Mata was particularly well informed on the Bilderberg Group, being a former head ofSpanish intelligence; not least because of this, his statements should be treated withcaution. The Hotel De Bilderberg, flagship of the Bilderberg Groep Hotels andRestaurants, is itself also still running – see www.bilderberg.nl.(13) Pinay's political career is dealt with in depth in Rimbaud; the book makes nomention of the Cercle Pinay and includes only a passing reference to Maître Violet inconnection with the sniffer planes scandal, detailed below.(14) Faligot and Krop, pg 194.(15) Crozier, pg 191.(16) On Violet's links to the pre-war Cagoule, his SDECE career and his earlyrelationship with Antoine Pinay, see Faligot and Krop, pgs 193-200; Péan, pgs 33-54- the major book on the sniffer plane scandal; Mungo - a key AESP\MAUE insidersource; Lobster 18, pgs 24-25; Crozier pgs 97 and 191-192. On the Cagoule ingeneral, see Bourdrel. Europe-Amerique would publish an interesting article on theCagoule just after the war – see the 7th February 1946 issue.(17) Crozier, pg 192. The significance of these Franco-German encounters can bejudged from a contemporary article in the International Herald Tribune: "The warmestexpression of French-German friendship and cooperation since the end of World WarII was contained in a joint communique issued last night [Sept. 14] by FrenchPremier Charles de Gaulle and West German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer followinga meeting in Colombey-les-Deux-Eglises. 'We are convinced', the communique said,'that close cooperation between the German Federal Republic and the FrenchRepublic is the foundation of all constructive action in Europe. It contributes to thereinforcement of the Atlantic Alliance. It is indispensable to the world'. 'We feel', thecommunique further declared, 'that the hostility of the past is forever at an end andthat Frenchmen and Germans are called upon to live in accord and to worktogether.' Mr. Adenauer spent the night in the general's home" - International HeraldTribune, 15/9/58, republished in the IHT on 15/9/08.(18) Mémoires, Critérion, Paris 1991, pgs 285-286.(19) Le Figaro, 2/4/63, quoted by Gonsalez-Mata, pg 38. At the 1955 Bilderbergconference in Bavaria, Strauss was accompanied by General Gehlen, head of theBND - see Gonsalez-Mata, pg 27.(20) Frankfurter Rundschau, 13/9/63, reproduced in IGfM, pg 75.(21) Spiegel, 10/1980, pg 23; Spiegel-Buch, pg 110, an invaluable source onStrauss.(22) Gonsalez-Mata, pg 26.(23) Crozier, pg 33.(24) Crozier, pg 32.(25) Crozier, pgs 29-31.(26) Many MI6 officers and agents worked on the staff of the Economist at one timeor another, amongst them the famous double agent Kim Philby (who had beenrecommended to the journal by top MI6 officers Sir John Sinclair and G. K. Young),Tom Little and Patrick Honey, two IRD writers who would join Crozier in the ISC,and last and most certainly not least, Robert Moss.(27) Crozier, pg 32. As part of the post-war decentralisation of German governmentoffices, the BND had been located in Pullach near Munich in the heart of Strauss'sfief, Bavaria. This geographic consideration and shared political convictions led to alongstanding close relationship between Strauss's CSU and the BND under Gehlenand Wessel right up until the FDP's "Kinkel coup" of 1980, when Wessel wasreplaced by Genscher's man, Klaus Kinkel, a future German Foreign Minister,putting an end to the "Gehlen dynasty" and the BND's longstanding affiliation withthe Right. The relationship between Strauss and Gehlen did not however always runsmoothly - see Höhne and Zolling. By 1962, Foertsch would be the Inspector-General of the German Army; it would be an article on Foertsch by Spiegel editorConrad Ahlers in September 1962 that would trigger the Spiegel Affair – see Höhneand Zolling, pg 216.(28) Dorril and Ramsay, 1990, pg 6. After the war, the NTS would be the parentbody for the IGfM - see IGfM.(29) Höhne and Zolling, pgs 33-36.(30) “As in neighbouring Belgium, the Dutch stay-behind army was also made upof two branches. One branch was called Operations, or O for short. It was directedby Louis Einthoven, a cold warrior who died in 1973 [incorrect; aged 83, Einthovendied in 1979] and throughout his life had warned of the dangers of communism.Einthoven, who ran the O branch for 16 years in secrecy, was also the first directorof the Dutch post-war domestic security service Binnenlandse Veiligheidsdienst(BVD). “The double function of Einthoven as chief [of] BVD and of O was of coursevery valuable to us,” a former unnamed member of O recalled, for this helped tofirmly integrate the secret army into the Dutch intelligence community. The secondbranch of the Dutch stay-behind was Intelligence, or I. It had been set up after WorldWar Two by J.M. Somer, but was commanded by J.J.L. Baron van Lynden afterSomer was dispatched to the Dutch colony of Indonesia in 1948 to fight theindependence movement there. … The O unit, under Einthoven, carried outsabotage and and guerrilla operations, and was charged with strengthening the localresistance and creating a new resistance movement. O was also in charge ofsensitizing people to the danger of communism during times of peace. Moreover, Owas trained in covert action operations, including the use of guns and explosives,and possessed independent secret arms caches.” - Ganser, pgs 85-86. Thoseinterested in Gladio should see the excellent book NATO’s Secret Armies – OperationGladio and Terrorism in Western Europe (Frank Cass, London 2005) by Ganser, whois a Senior Researcher at the Centre for Security Studies at the Federal Institute ofTechnology (ETH) in Zurich, Switzerland. ETH also hosts the Parallel History Projecton NATO and the Warsaw Pact (PHP) at www.isn.ethz.ch/php, a cooperative researchproject run by the Centre for Security Studies at ETH Zurich and the NationalSecurity Archive at the George Washington University. On Einthoven, see Jan. H.Kompagnie, 'Einthoven, Louis (1896-1979)', in Biografisch Woordenboek vanNederland 3 (Den Haag 1989). It is interesting to note that the Intelligence Directorof the Dutch Gladio network, J.J.L. Baron van Lynden, had been imprisoned duringthe war in Colditz Castle, as had Neave, Stirling and Elwell – see Paul Koedijk, Gladioin Nederland inVrij Nederland, 25/01/92.(31) Crozier, pg 32.(32) See Marks, chapter 9; Thomas.(33) Laurent, pg 303, quoting Zangrandi.(34) Crozier appears to be mistaken in claiming that INTERDOC was created"shortly after" the Bad Godesberg meeting in March; the registration papers actuallydate from February 1963.(35) Dorril and Ramsay (1990), pg 6. On INTERDOC in general, see Zangrandi;Libération, 9/10/75; Laurent, pgs 303-304; Verhoeven and Uytterhagen; Dorril andRamsay, 1990, pgs 6-8; Crozier, pgs 29-33, 45-49. INTERDOC and CEDI are themost promising subjects of research to understand the early Cercle complex.(36) See Bloch and Fitzgerald.(37) It is interesting to note that the 1955 Bilderberg conference was held inBarbizon, the same venue as the seminal INTERDOC group in 1961. PrinceBernhard's role may be indicative of possible help given by the Bilderberg group,only recently created itself, to the fledging INTERDOC organisation.(38) I have not been able to track down Einthoven's memoirs (Tegen de stroom in:levende vissen zwemmen tegen de stroom in, alleen de dooie drijven mee, Apeldoorn,1974, ISBN 90-6086-596-0) – it would no doubt be a useful source.(39) Crozier, pg 49.(40) Crozier, pg 46.(41) Stevenson, pg 253. Ellis's intelligence career is given in Dorril. On Menzies'rôle in Gladio, see his letter to the Belgian Prime Minister of 1949 in Gijsels (1991),pgs 149-150. Crozier also notes that "Ronald Franks" of MI6, to whom Crozierreported on the Bonnemaison/INTERDOC meetings, expressed "great interest" inthem - Crozier, pg 31.(42) Dorril and Ramsay, pgs 6-7; biography in Dorril.(43) On the links between INTERDOC, the ISC and the Monday Club, see TimeOut, 29/8/75; Ramsay and Dorril, pgs 3 and 40-41. On the history of the anti-unionoutfits Common Cause and IRIS, see Dorril and Ramsay's In a Common Cause – theanti-communist crusade in Britain 1945-60 in Lobster 19 (May 1990), pgs 1-8, andRamsay’s The Clandestine Caucus – anti-socialist campaigns and operations in theBritish Labour Movement since the war, Lobster Special Issue, undated.(44) Van Doorslaer et Verhoeyen, pg 143; Laurent, pg 41 et seq; Gladio, pg 77;Willan, pg 33.(45) Retinger, pgs 236-237.(46) Laurent, pgs 302-303.(47) Crozier, pgs 102-104. From 1961 on, Est-Ouest would produce a LatinAmerican edition, Este y Oeste, and an Italian edition, Documenti sul communismo. Inthe 1950s, one of the editorial team working on Est-Ouest with Albertini was RolandCoquillot, alias Gaucher, present at the 1975 fascist summit at de Bonvoisin's castle- Brewaeys and Deliège, pg 34. Gaucher, a former militant in Marcel Déat's RNP,would work for Albertini's magazine for over ten years – see CelsiuS no. 52, August-September 1992.(48) Young European Federalists, pg 208. Grau was co-founder of another politicalfront group similar to the Frankfurt Study Group, the Hamburg-based Staats- undWirtschaftspolitische Gesellschaft (Political and Economic Society, SWG), createdin Cologne on 9th April 1962. The SWG still exists today and is notorious for its far-Right sympathies. Their website (http://www.swg-hamburg.de/index.html) gives alist of previous SWG speakers, many of whom belonged to CEDI and later groups inthe Cercle complex, notably Grau's Swiss ISP, the IfD and the EIS, on all of whichsee below. Amongst SWG speakers, we find Filbinger, Habsburg, Col. GerhardHubatschek, Huyn, General Karst, Kurt Klein, Major-General Komossa, Dr. Marx,von Merkatz, von Richthofen, Professor Rohrmoser, Dr. Sager and Reginald Steed.Another of the SWG's speakers was Father Lothar Groppe, a Jesuit Military Chaplainfrom 1962 on, who worked from 1963 to 1971 as Military Chaplain and lecturer atthe German Army's Command School, also based in Hamburg, with which the SWGwas closely linked. Groppe would later lecture for the Austrian Army CommandSchool from 1973 to 1987, and would direct the German section of Radio Vatican forsome years. With Huyn and Löwenthal, Groppe would go on to found a ConservativeBureau in Bielefeld, of which little else is known. A web article on the SWG fromAntifaschistische Informationen, Rechte Organisationen in Hamburg, Nr. 1 of02/06/95 (online at http://www.nadir.org/nadir/archiv/Antifaschismus/Organisationen/Diverse/AIswg.html) names as further SWG speakers Löwenthal,Dr. Böx of the AESP, General Schall and Polish-German exile Herbert Hupka, aBoard member of Grau's earlier Frankfurt Study Group, a fervent opponent ofOstpolitik and CDU MP from 1969 to 1987. A series of SWG documents areincluded in the invaluable annex in Young European Federalists, including a 1976issue of Vertrauliche Mitteilungen aus Politik und Wirtschaft (Confidential News fromPolitics and the Economy), another newsletter produced by Grau, which advertiseda three-day lecture tour by Habsburg jointly organised by the SWG and PEU.(49) Willan, pgs 123-124 - the best English-language account of the manipulationof democracy and terrorism in Italy in the post-war period, and very highlyrecommended.(50) For details of delle Chiaie, Giannettini and Aginter Press, see Christie'sexcellent book; Laurent; Bale, pgs 2-18; Willan, particularly Chapters 6 and 7.(51) Christie (1984), pg 28.(52) Laurent, pg 304; Roth and Ender, pg 54; Willan, pgs 41 and 95; Gonsalez-Mata, pg 78.(53) On the IRD in general, see Bloch and Fitzgerald; Smith; Fletcher - a majorsource on the IRD; Guardian, 27/1/78; Observer, 29/1/78; New Statesman,27/2/81; Leveller, 64/1981; Guardian, 18/12/81; Tribune, 2/9/83, 9/9/83. A latersource not integrated here is Paul Lashmar and James Oliver's book Britain's SecretPropaganda War, published in 1998 by Sutton Publishing.(54) Crozier, pgs 56-57.(55) Saunders, pg 261.(56) Saunders, pgs 311-312.(57) Crozier, pgs 72-74. Crozier's biography of Franco would be translated intoSpanish by Esteban Perruca, in charge of the newsreels section of the InformationMinistry.(58) The IAS was an affiliate of the American Security Council Foundation - seeBellant, pgs 30-31. On the NSIC, Casey would testify at the Senate hearing toconfirm his CIA appointment: "As a founding Director of the National StrategyInformation Center, I supported the establishment of chairs and professorships innational security on 200 campuses throughout the United States" – see StateResearch no.22, February-March 1981, pgs 86-87.(59) Crozier, pg 74.(60) Crozier, pg 90.(61) Crozier, pgs 85-86.(62) Crozier, pg 86.(63) This study is too brief to cover all of the activities of the ISC in any depth: seeTime Out, 20/6/75, 29/8/75, 5/9/75, 30/9/77; CIA, Students of Conflict, SteveWeissman, Embassy Magazine, August 1976, reprinted as The CIA makes the newsin Dirtywork 1: the CIA in Western Europe, pgs 204-210; Searchlight no.18, November1976, no. 20, January 1977; Guardian, 20, 21, 31/12/76; Daily Mail, 22/12/76;Private Eye, 7/1/77; State Research no. 1, pgs 13-17; Laurent, pgs 304-305;Gonsalez-Mata, pgs 162-163; Winter, 1981, pgs 170-171, 321, 543-544; Bloch andFitzgerald, pgs 98-99; Freemantle, pgs 189-191; Péan, pgs 65-70; Ramsay and Dorril- essential reading; Norton-Taylor, pgs 73-74 - an excellent overview of the Britishsecurity and intelligence services; Herman and O'Sullivan, pgs 108-112, aninvaluable study on terrorism and propaganda groupings; Dorril and Ramsay (1991)- indispensable; Toczek - an outstanding summary of the British Right including theMonday Club, SIF, NAFF, ISC and FARI; Crozier – from the horse’s mouth, albeitguardedly...(64) Both donations were organised by Sir Robert Thompson - Crozier, pg 90.(65) As the NSIC was to play a crucial role in the birth and life of the ISC, it isworth including the full NSIC article by GroupWatch as an annex below.(66) Minutes of the ISC Council meeting on 2/1/72 in Knight, pg 176.(67) Crozier, pg 90.(68) Leveller, 64/1981. It is interesting to note that two IRD offshoots were createdat roughly the same time: the ISC in London in 1970 and the Information Policy Unitin Northern Ireland in 1971 - both were involved in anti-Left propaganda in thecritical period 1973-75, InfPol providing forged documents to discredit politicians,the ISC railing on about Communist subversion in the unions, media, etc. InfPol'soperations would be exposed by top operative Colin Wallace in 1985: see Ramsayand Dorril; Foot; Dorril and Ramsay (1991).(69) Saunders, pgs 107-111. In his memoirs, Crozier writes about recruitingGoodwin to the ISC: "[in 1970] I had known Goodwin for eight or nine years from thetime he had commissioned a long study from me on Communist China's steelindustry. A publishing venture he was involved in had collapsed, and I had helpedhim find a job with the Congress for Cultural Freedom, from which I now lured him"(Crozier, pgs 89-90). This seems to confuse chronologies: Crozier says he knewGoodwin from around 1961-62, yet the only recorded collapsed publishing ventureand CCF involvement of Goodwin's dates back to the early 1950s. Saunders addsthat Goodwin would later become a Features and Drama Director at the BBC.(70) For biographic details of many ISC authors, see Dorril; on ISC/IRD links, seeRamsay and Dorril.(71) Crozier, pg 98. For a biography of Moss, see Covert Action Information Bulletinnos. 7 and 10; Coxsedge, Coldicut and Harant, pg 124 (who report that Moss was"son of a senior Australian Defence officer"); Ramsay and Dorril, pgs 53-54; Dorriland Ramsay (1991); Toczek.(72) Toczek, pg 29.(73) All three pacification supremos in Vietnam would later develop links with theCercle Pinay: Thompson (ISC Council), Robert Komer (Board of the ISC's Americanoffshoot WISC) and William Colby (guest at a Cercle Pinay meeting in December1979).(74) Clutterbuck would later combine forces with Peter Janke and ISC librarianRichard Sims in Control Risks, perhaps the world's most prominent businesssecurity and kidnap ransom agency – see below. Clutterbuck died in 1998.(75) Crozier, pgs 102-104.(76) By 1978 Biggs-Davison would be a Life Member of the Habsburg-Violet-Damman group, the AESP.(77) In 1951 he served on the Board of the British Society for Cultural Freedomalongside Michael Goodwin, the future Administrative Director of the ISC. SeeSaunders, pgs 76, 88, 110; Crozier, pg 15.(78) Howarth devotes a chapter to Julian Amery in his history of the SOE; also seeAmery's Sons of the Eagle (1948) and Nigel West's The Secret War, Coronet, London1993. Amery was responsible for British links with General Draza Mihailovic, leaderof the Chetniks, Serbian monarchist irregulars fighting the German occupation.Charged with collaboration, Mihailovic was shot by Tito in 1946. The Britishrendition of anti-Tito resistance fighters to Yugoslavia after the war (leading to theirexecution) was heavily criticized by Count Nikolai Tolstoy in his mid-1980s books,Victims of Yalta and The Minister and the Massacres, the latter attributing blame toMacmillan; Amery sided with Tolstoy who was feted at a Monday Club dinner in1988. For Amery's more recent contacts with the Chetniks, see Observer, 17/5/92.On the Albanian operation, see Leigh, pgs 11-13 for a brief summary, Verrier for anintelligent insider's view; the main documentary work is Nicholas Bethell's The GreatBetrayal, London 1984, which has many references to Amery. Tom Bower's The RedWeb, Aurum Press, London 1989, details MI6 landings in Northern Russia. Afterservice in the Balkans, Amery would serve from 1945 until demobilisation in Chinaas aide to General Carton de Wiart, British representative to General Chiang KaiShek. Around this time, Julian's brother John, a convinced fascist, was hung by theBritish government for having gone to Germany, joined the Nazis and organised theBritish Free Corps to fight alongside the Germans on the Russian front. As well asbeing a prominent member of the Monday Club during G. K. Young's ascendancy,Julian Amery was allegedly linked with Young to South Africa's development of anuclear programme. Amery was a Director of the South African Vaal ReefsExploration and Mining Corporation, and a consultant to the Bank of Credit andCommerce International, implicated in many cases of money laundering from armsand drugs trafficking, which collapsed in July 1991. BCCI's London branch wasused as a conduit for CIA payments to 490 of its British contacts - see Guardian,26/7/91. Amery resigned from the Monday Club in February 1991 in protest at itstakeover by racist extreme right-wingers - see Observer, 24/2/91. A biography ofJulian Amery is given in Dorril, pg 2; he died in 1996.(79) On Stewart-Smith, see Ramsay and Dorril; Dorril and Ramsay (1991); Toczek.FAPC would be liquidated in 1986; Stewart-Smith died in 2004.(80) The major sources on Young are Lobster 9-21, and particularly nos. 11(Ramsay and Dorril) and 19, pgs 15-19, for an autobiographical obituary written byYoung some time before his death in May 1990 - Young's account studiously avoidshis days in the Monday Club, NAFF and Unison; Christie (no date), pgs 123-130 fora preliminary investigation; Toczek for an essential piece of research on Young andthe Tory Right; Dorril and Ramsay (1991) which puts Young's efforts into context;Dorril for his MI6 career. Also see Bloch and Fitzgerald; Foot, pgs 78-79, 435;Verrier, chapters 3 and 4. Young's own book on subversion is well worth a read.(81) Christie (1984), pgs 35-36; Willan, pgs 99-102 et seq.; Gladio, pgs 78 - 96;Herman and Brodhead, pg 80.(82) Toczek, pgs 15-16.(83) Gonsalez-Mata, pg 315. Bennett's mother Marguerite was a Kleinwort. Themerger between Kleinwort and Benson in 1961 was facilitated by the fact that CyrilKleinwort (Bilderberg participant, 1966 and 1971) and Mark Turner of Benson's werealready working together as Directors of Commercial Union. Kleinwort Benson wasbought by the Dresdner Bank in 1995; since 2006, the company has been known asDresdner Kleinwort. Kleinwort Benson still maintains its longstanding contacts withthe Bilderberg Group; Simon Robertson, the former Chairman of the KleinwortBenson Group plc, attended the 1997 Bilderberg meeting in Atlanta – see Lobster 35,pg 31.(84) Gonsalez-Mata, pgs 290-291. The conference was held in the ParamountImperial Hotel in Torquay, the constituency (renamed Torbay in 1974) that Bennettheld for thirty-two years from his victory in a 1955 by-election until his retirementfrom Parliament in 1987. His successor as Torbay MP would be Rupert Allason whowrites authorised intelligence histories under the pen-name Nigel West. Between1963 and 1984, Bennett would attend fourteen annual Bilderberg conferences(1963, 1964, 1966-68, 1971, 1973-75, 1977-80, 1984). Bennett's part in Young'sUnison was described in Peter Cadogan's Unlicensed Rebel of the Right: "15 July1976: Today I had lunch with GKY [Young] ... he told me that when he first had theidea that is now Unison, he saw General Templer about it. Templer was interestedbut too old and sick to act and he suggested General [Sir Walter] Walker ... The formthe thing now takes is that of an instant communications network capable of actingat the highest level if the established machinery and government breaks down ... Thekey man in the [House of] Commons is Sir Frederic Bennett and with him are sometwenty other MPs ... Unison will go public later this year" – see Dorril's Lobster no.26, pg 23. In 1979, Bennett published Reds under the Bed, or the Enemy at the Gate– and Within which went into a third edition in 1982 and which may well have been acontribution to the Cercle/6I UK propaganda campaign. From 1979 to 1987, Bennettwas the leader of the UK delegation to and also Chairman of the Council of Europeand Western European Union Assemblies; his predecessor as Chairman of the WEUAssembly from 1977 to 1979 was Kai-Uwe von Hassel, guest at a 1976 AESPmeeting. Bennett died in 2002.(85) See Winter (1981), pgs 382-383; Penrose and Courtiour.(86) See Hain's book A Putney Plot, Spokesman Books, London 1986, whichincludes information from Colin Wallace. Wallace's 1974 notes show that Thorpe,Hain and other Liberals had also been targetted by MI5 in an attempt to prevent acoalition between the Liberals and Wilson's minority Labour government.(87) Dumont, pgs 174-179. Dumont obtained his information by infiltrating AESPcircles under the pseudonym of Maurice Sartan.(88) Gijsels, L'Enquête, pg 224 et seq. - despite some inaccuracies and no index,the best introduction to the '70s plans for coups d'etat, the 'Brabant Wallon killers',the extreme right and the strategy of tension in Belgium. It should however be readin conjunction with Brewaeys and Deliège, who have produced the (so far) definitivework on de Bonvoisin, PIO and the WNP scandal.(89) Dumont; Laurent, pgs 297-298. The ABN and its sister group, the EuropeanFreedom Council, held their joint conference entitled "Our Alternative" in Brusselsfrom November 12th to 15th 1970. A previous joint ABN/EFC conference on "How toDefeat Russia" was held in London on October 15th to 22nd, 1968.(90) Péan, pg 76.(91) Le Vif/L'Express, 19/5/89.(92) Dumont; Le Vif/L'Express, 19/5/89.(93) Christie (1984), pgs 28-29.(94) Aginter Press's contact within the CSU was Strauss's secretary, Marcel Hepp,who also edited the Strauss newspaper, Bayern Kurier – see Laurent, pg 133.(95) L'Espresso, 24/03/74, quoted in Péan, pg 83.(96) Dumont, Le Vif/L'Express, 19/5/89.(97) Péan, pg 65. It is worth noting that in his progress report on CREC, Guérin-Sérac also mentions a meeting with Damman in Vienna in May 1969: could thethree men have met at the same symposium?(98) Published in Péan.(99) On De Roover, Milpol, the Delcourt network and Gladio, see Van Doorslaerand Verhoeyen; Histoire de glaives, Michel Bouffioux, in Gladio, various authors, pgs29-60. On Vankerkhoven and CEDI Belgium, see Van Bosbeke, pg 15.Vankerkhoven would sit in the European Parliament for the PSC from 1982 to 1984.(100) Roth and Ender, pg 73.(101) Unheimliche Patrioten, pg 437 - an indispensable encyclopaedia of the SwissRight.(102) Unheimliche Patrioten, pg 431.(103) Crozier, pgs 72-74.(104) Laurent, pg 302.(105) " "These conferences [Paris, December 1960; Rome, 1961], attended by publicfigures from some fifty countries, had the aim of bringing together "beyond thebounds of nations or of doctrines eminent persons from political, academic,diplomatic, trade-union and media circles for the defence of freedom". Its Board ofSponsors notably included Senators Dodd, Keating, Mundt, Admiral Burke,Presidents Paul-Henri Spaak, Paul Van Zeeland, Antoine Pinay, René Pleven,Maurice Schumann, Heinrich von Brentano, Fulbert Youlou, Ivan Matteo Lombardo,Pacciardi, Carlos Lacerda, Jules Romain and Gabriel Marcel" (Henri Coston:Dictionnaire de la politique française). Amongst the other French representatives wereGeneral Vanuxem, François Duprat, former leader of Ordre Nouveau ... the lawyerGeorges de Maleville, member of the National Front, Georges Albertini and manyexiles from Eastern European countries" (Laurent, pg 302). Suzanne Labin and herhusband Edouard, the two mainstays of the French section of WACL, were amongstthe earliest contacts of Aginter Press; a contact list of Aginter Press published by theinquiry into Aginter Press carried out by the post-revolutionary Portugueseintelligence service SDCI mentions a meeting between the Labins and Aginter Pressin December 1966, only a few months after Aginter Press's creation - see Laurent, pg302.(106) At a July 1973 meeting of the European Freedom Council in London, theparticipants included Lombardo, Otto von Habsburg, WACL notables David Rowe,Kuboki and Raimundo Guerrero, and French General Paul Vanuxem, who had hadlinks to the OAS and would be involved in the last-ditch stand of the Vietnam war -"Vanuxem was present at the closing stages of the Vietnam War, urging theincoming South Vietnamese President, General Minh, to keep fighting until the bitterend, which came only a few days later" (Decent Interval, Frank Snepp, Penguin,London 1980). Vanuxem would later figure on a 1978 AESP membership list as amember of an AESP Study Group. The European Freedom Council, sister group tothe ABN, is certainly worth further investigation; it continued in existence until atleast 1991 - see the obituary in the Times, 3/3/06, of one UK member, UkrainianbornStefan Terlezki, CBE, outspoken Conservative MP for Cardiff West from 1983to 1987. The ABN/EFC would hold joint conferences in London in 1982 ("TheWest’s Strongest Allies") and again in 1985.(107) L'Espresso, 17/12/74; Willan. I am indebted to Jeff Bale for information onLombardo and other Italian members of the AESP.(108) Naylor, pg 259, who points out that a water-sniffing plane would be of greatuse to Pesenti’s cement company.(109) The Cercle Pinay complex had multiple links to Calvi's Banco Ambrosianowhich are described below. This essay cannot however attempt to give a full accountof the financial links between the Vatican Bank, P2, Sindona, Calvi and Pesenti - seeCornwell; Yallop; Raw; Naylor.(110) Christie (1984), pgs 20-21, 33, 47-49; Willan, pg 44.(111) Péan, pgs 97-102. The UBS's German title is the SchweizerischeBankgesellschaft, SBG.(112) Péan, pg 213.(113) Bacelon, pgs 243-244; Wolton, pg 258.(114) Dans le secret des princes, Christine Ockrent et le Comte de Marenches,Livres de poche Stock 1986, pgs 135-137. An English translation was published asThe Evil Empire, Sidgwick & Jackson (Chapman Pincher's publishers ...), London1988. Crozier suggests personal rivalries as a cause for Violet's dismissal – seeCrozier, pg 191, also quoted below.(115) Crozier, pg 97 et seq.(116) Crozier, pg 64.(117) Crozier, pg 98.(118) Reproduced in Péan, pg 236.(119) Bloch and Fitzgerald, pgs 98-99.(120) State Research no. 1; Ramsay and Dorril, pg 38.(121) Crozier, pg 100.(122) Crozier, pgs 100-101.(123) 1972 saw a major investment in expanding the Cercle's output from the ISCand Le Monde Moderne, much of it financed by Pesenti. Interestingly, Pesenti'sfinancial operations in 1972 were a particular focus of Italian magistratesinvestigating the Banco Ambrosiano scandal: "Of particular interest was a 1972"loan" to Pesenti from the IOR. It was indexed to the Swiss franc and, when repaid,cost him three times the sum originally contracted. Whether it was a smart businessoperation by the IOR, a cover for Pesenti's pumping money into the Vatican bank, orsimply a device for the IOR to help Pesenti illegally move a large sum of cash abroadwill likely remain a mystery" - Naylor, pg 127.(124) Péan, pgs 92-93.(125) Stewart-Smith, pgs 66-67.(126) Mungo, pgs 39 - 40; Gijsels, L'Enquête, pgs 156-157. See footnote 322 belowfor other CLEW members.(127) Walsh, pgs 133-134; Van Bosbeke, pg 66.(128) By 2002, Valori would be the President of the Industrialists Union of Italy(Confindustria) and a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador - see the UNESCO Appeal inInternational Herald Tribune, 12/06/02.(129) Peron's Italian contacts came via his wartime service as Argentinian Consul inRome.(130) Naylor, pg 138; information from Jeff Bale; Raw, pg 143; Willan, pgs 60-61;Buongiorno, pgs 111-115; Cecchi, pgs 75-85.(131) Crozier, pgs 99-100.(132) Péan, pgs 237-239.(133) Péan, pgs 52 and 68; Roth and Ender, pg 72. Bacelon claims that Andreottihad attended one of the AESP's earlier Charlemagne Dinners on 6th May 1970, alsoheld in Aachen and attended by Pinay, Violet and de Villegas. Bacelon is generallyunreliable, but gives accurate details of the 1973 Dinner mentioned here; hisinformation about the 1970 Dinner may well be correct.(134) Brewaeys and Deliège, pg 129; Roth and Ender, pgs 72-73; Joel van derReijden. Longstanding CDU foreign policy spokesman and one of Brandt's mostprominent opponents on Ostpolitik, Dr Werner Marx would serve as a CDU MP from1965 until his death in 1985; he would chair the German Parliament's ForeignAffairs Committee from 1982 to 1985.(135) Roth and Ender, pg 72.(136) Péan, pg 82.(137) See notably Gijsels, L'Enquête, pg 197 et seq., Benjamin and Dethy, and theother books on Belgian parapolitics listed below. The Tratsaert report is quoted infull in Gijsels, Het Leugenpaleis, pgs 61-66.(138) On de Bonvoisin, see CelsiuS, numbers 12, 14, 15, 16, 17, 21, 22, 23, 24, 26,29, 30, 31, 34; Brewaeys and Deliège, and the other books on Belgian parapoliticsquoted below.(139) Mungo (as "Michel de Frocourt"), pg 22. Van Bosbeke states (pg 18) that thiswas a quarterly publication whose second issue named Mungo as the author; I havebeen unable to obtain it.(140) Brewaeys and Deliège, pg 180; Brewaeys and Deliège also note (pg 39) that deBonvoisin arranged a contract for a business contact by taking him to Paris in 1986to meet Paul Violet, Jean Violet's son and deputy to the Mayor of Paris, JacquesChirac. Violet junior was also Vice-President of the Regional Council of the Ile-de-France, member of the National Council of Chirac's RPR and founder in 1991 of theChirac lobby group, République et Valeurs (Le Monde, 20/9/91).(141) De Bock quoted in CelsiuS No. 17, pgs 17-18; Brewaeys and Deliège, pgs 24-25.(142) See Gladio, pgs 29-60.(143) Extracts are given in CelsiuS no. 17, pgs 14-19.(144) Searchlight, no. 18, Nov 1976, pg 4.(145) Crozier, pg 104.(146) Crozier, pg 104.(147) Eringer, pgs 37-40.(148) Reproduced in the Morning Star, the official British Communist newspaper,31/1/76.(149) Crozier, pg 106.(150) Crozier, pg 107.(151) James Theberge of the CSIS and future Washington ISC President, alsocontributed to the campaign - see below on the WISC.(152) Herman and O'Sullivan, pgs 82-83; ISC publications list; Ramsay and Dorril,pgs 38-39; Robert Moss, The Collapse of Democracy, Maurice Temple Smith, London1975; Crozier, pgs 109-111.(153) Péan, pgs 72-73. Curiously, Damman does not know of or does not think ofthe Cercle offshoot in the US, the Washington Institute for the Study of Conflict,founded the previous month. A whole series of ISC Conflict Studies in 1975-76focused on the areas named by Damman under point 2 - Korea, Vietnam, the MiddleEast, Portugal, and the security of supply of raw materials: Iraq: the Search forStability (May 1975), Southern Europe: NATO's Crumbling Flank (June 1975), Portugal- Revolution and Backlash (September 1975), North Korea - Undermining the Truce(March 1976) and Stability in the Gulf: The Oil Revolution (May 1976).(154) On the destabilization of democracy in the UK in the 1970s, see Penrose andCourtiour; Lobster 9 -21 and notably No. 11 (Ramsay and Dorril); Wright; Leigh;Foot; Dorril and Ramsay (1991). On these sources, Penrose and Courtiour were thefirst and came very close but then were led astray. Lobster pursued the story andproduced much invaluable information, launching the Wallace story before Wrighthad even appeared. Wright, whilst being an inside source, is partial in its opinionsand in its content. Leigh thoroughly documented one aspect - the straight Wilson-Wright struggle (see however Lobster 17) but has grave omissions, particularly inonly focusing on Wilson to the exclusion of Heath, Thorpe and the many otherpoliticians targeted, and in totally omitting Winter and Wallace as key witnesses, andthe counter-subversion lobby and other MI6 friends as key actors. Foot concentrateson the major witness, Wallace, and does an excellent job. Dorril and Ramsay (1991)continue the investigation they started in Lobster 11, and produce the most completeaccount of the destabilization to date.(155) Ramsay and Dorril; Foot. It is interesting to note that various figuresmentioned in Wallace's 1974 notes about this manipulation of domestic politicsinclude G. K. Young, Geoffrey Stewart-Smith, John Biggs-Davison and Julian Amery,all four members of the Monday Club. Biggs-Davison and Amery were mentioned aspossible contenders for the leadership of the Conservative party once Heath hadbeen removed; it seems Young and Stewart-Smith were intended as channels forInfPol's disinformation.(156) Times, 6/5/73.(157) Dorril and Ramsay (1991), pgs 229-233.(158) On Wallace and CO2, see Ramsay and Dorril; Foot; Dorril and Ramsay (1991).Wallace's testimony - and the mass of documentary evidence to support it -represents without a doubt the most serious exposure of the British secret state’sintervention in domestic politics – the British Watergate - since the Second WorldWar. The three sources listed above are essential reading for anyone interested in"the very British coup".(159) Leigh, pgs 163-180, 239-241.(160) Wolton, pgs 168-169. The cash slush fund run for decades by the UIMMwould be the subject of extensive French press revelations in 2008 following theappointment of a new director.(161) Péan, pg 71.(162) Péan, pgs 240-241.(163) On the Elf network and the Gabon connection, see Péan (1983). The Elfnetwork would also intervene in domestic politics during the 1981 elections - the Elfnetwork was the channel chosen to transfer FF 2,000,000 from Gabonese oilrevenue to support Giscard d'Estaing's 1981 election campaign. In 1979, Robert hadbeen appointed French Ambassador to Gabon on Gabonese President Bongo'sinsistence, and much to the disquiet of the French Foreign Office. See Péan (1983),pgs 139-150.(164) Péan, pgs 117-119, 135-136, 156; Wolton, pg 266.(165) On Muldergate, see Winter (1981), (1989) and (2004); Manz; Rees and Day;The Great White Hoax .(166) The first editor of To The Point was Dr. Eschel Rhoodie for the nine monthspreceding his appointment to the Department of Information - The Great White Hoax,pg 32.(167) Péan, pg 110.(168) The Great White Hoax, pg 4. A similar campaign targeting German MPs andmilitary officers was equally successful – see below.(169) Péan, pgs 92-93, 107-113.(170) Péan, pg 108.(171) Péan, pg 113.(172) Laurent, pg 305.(173) Guardian, 30/3/73.(174) Winter (1981), pgs 320-321; Time Out, 5/9/75, and Herman and O'Sullivan,pgs 110, 116-117, 134. Morris’ book South African Terrorism was published byHarold Timmins in 1973. A certain Michael A. Morris would write Conflict Study no.230, Conflicts in Latin America: Democratic Alternatives in the 1990s, published inApril 1990 by the ISC's successor, RISCT.(175) On the ASC, see Bellant, a outstanding piece of research on Reagan's links tothe American far Right. Son of World War II navy aviation pioneer and four-starAdmiral John 'Slew' Sidney McCain, four-star Admiral John 'Jack' Sidney McCainJnr would participate in the bombing of Hanoi as Commander US Pacific Forces(CINCPAC) during the early Vietnam war whilst his Navy pilot son – the 2008Republican presidential candidate, John Sidney McCain III – was being held in the'Hanoi Hilton'.(176) Janke would later send Conflict Study no. 52 to Robbertze; see the letter of28/1/75 to Janke from Lt-Gen. K. R. Coster of the DGSS published in Searchlightno. 20, Jan 1977, pg 4.(177) Données pour un moment in Bulletin du Centre de recherches et informationssociales et économiques (CRISE), no. 2, 15/6/77, quoted in Faligot, pgs 181-182;Péan, pgs 113-114.(178) See bibliography in Huyn.(179) Herman and O'Sullivan, pgs 109-110; Time Out, 5-11/9/75.(180) See founding document in Searchlight no. 18, November 1976, pg 5.(181) Covert Action Information Bulletin no. 10, August-September 1980, pg 42.(182) Gonsalez-Mata, pgs 149-155; Eringer, pgs 45 and 49.(183) See Valentine, Snepp; for a discussion of Thompson and Komer's part in thePhoenix programme, see State Research no. 17 (April-May 1980), pgs 105-106.(184) See Cooley.(185) Covert Action Information Bulletin no. 10, August-September 1980, pg 42;RAND Corporation obituary.(186) See El Mercurio, 28/2/73 amongst others.(187) State Research no. 1, pgs 13-17.(188) On Team B, see the chapter in Peddlers of crisis - the CPD and the Politics ofContainment, Jerry W. Sanders, Pluto (UK)/South End Press (USA), 1983. Anotherprominent member of Team B was Admiral Thomas H. Moorer, former Head of theJoint Chiefs of Staff, later Director of the NSIC and Board member of the ASC andWestern Goals – see NSIC Annex below. Many of those who had been on Team B oron the White House staff at that time - notably Cheney, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz andPerle - would repeat this exercise of sidelining a politically awkward CIA finding as apart of the WMD fiasco during the second Iraq war in 2003. The wish of the neo-consto override CIA assessments and develop their own pro-war intelligence channels,largely reliant on the exile Iraqi National Congress under Chalabi, would be acatastrophic own goal – the INC intelligence network, infiltrated by the Iranianintelligence service, obligingly provided “firm evidence” of Iraqi WMDs, triggering theAmerican invasion which, in one fell swoop, reduced Iran’s regional rival to chaosand discredited Iran’s greatest geopolitical adversary, the US neo-con clique, in theeyes of the world. Larry Johnson, a former senior counter-terrorist official at theState Department, said: "When the story ultimately comes out, we'll see that Iranhas run one of the most masterful intelligence operations in history. Theypersuaded the US and Britain to dispose of its greatest enemy" - Guardian,Tuesday May 25, 2004. Vincent Cannistraro, a former senior CIA counter-terroristofficer, stated: "It's pretty clear that the Iranians had us for breakfast, lunch anddinner … I think Iran saw an opportunity here to feed information into the UnitedStates through [INC intelligence chief] Aras Habib Karim and Chalabi that influencedthe US decision … it seems that they were able to spread disinformation that foundits way into the speeches of policy makers in the United States … I think it was apretty artful operation by the Iranians” - Australian Broadcasting Corporation: TheWorld Today, 26/05/04.(189) Other members of the USCISC included Leonard D. Theberge, Vice-President of Rohr Industries; John Diebold of the Diebold Group; US Ambassadorto Venezuela Robert McClintock; Professor Donald Treadgold, Chairman,Department of History, University of Washington; Dr Ernest Lefever of theBrookings Institute. Lefever would be involved in the 1980s anti-disarmamentcampaigns assisted by the Cercle complex – as Director of the Ethics and PublicPolicy Program at Georgetown University, he would receive $200,000 from the USInformation Agency to coordinate anti-disarmament activity in the Churches –World in Action, 24/10/83, reported in Lobster 4 (1984), pg 16. "Ernest Lefeverused the $200,000 given by USIA to help “highly placed and influential leaders inWestern Europe to gain a solid understanding of US defence and arms controlpolicies, with special reference to their religious and moral implications.” Oneconference was organised in Britain in May (New Statesman, 20th May 1983) withchurch leaders in attendance. It was sponsored by the British Atlantic Committee(BAC) and the Institute for European Defence and Strategic Studies." - see SteveDorril’s American Friends: the Anti-CND Groups in Lobster 3 (1984), pgs 16-21. TheMay 1983 conference organized by Lefever was also attended by Sven Kraemer,then Program Director of the NSIC. On the BAC, IEDSS, CPS etc, see the excellentpieces by Lobster contributor William Clark at http://pinkindustry.wordpress.com.(190) Crozier, pg 124.(191) Crozier, pg 113.(192) Ironically, the death-blow to Crozier’s FWF could not have come from a betterfriend. As former head of the CIA's IOD from 1954 on, Cord Meyer had overseen CIAsupport for FWF since its inception. In the early 1970s, Meyer would direct theCovert Action department with the rank of Deputy Director. At this time he was avery close associate of Crozier's; Crozier records that he flew to Langley three or fourtimes a year to visit Meyer at Langley - Crozier, pgs 90-91. At the time of FWF’sexposure, Meyer was CIA Chief of Station in London - Crozier’s main linkman to theCIA throughout the crucial period of the mid-1970s.(193) Time Out, 20/6/75.(194) Conflicting Accounts, 29/8/75; Subversion Inc., 5/9/75.(195) ISC memo, 2/6/75 quoted in Péan, pg 86; as this is translated from theFrench, the text given here will not match the exact wording of the English original.See Ramsay and Dorril, pg 39. The same year as this ISC conference at DitchleyPark, one of its Governors, Professor the Lord Vaizey, whom we have already met asHonorary Treasurer of the British-Irish Association founded by Hamilton, Crozierand Moss after the ISC's 1972 Ditchley Park conference on Ireland, would serve asan adviser to an ISC Study Group on subversion in higher education which startedwork in November 1975 and which published its findings in September 1977 as anISC Special Report, The Attack on Higher Education. The ISC Education Study Groupalso included Professor Edward Shils of the WISC and Dr Kenneth Watkins of NAFFand Aims. See State Research no. 1, October 1977, pg 17; Time Out, 30/9/77.(196) Roth and Ender, pg 54; Gonsalez-Mata, pg 163; Crozier, pgs 124-125.(197) The exposure of FWF in June and of the ISC in August may have killed off theWashington ISC, created in March; nothing further is known of any specific WISCaction - it is probable that it was (sub)merged into the Rand Corporation. Crozieralso records that what he calls "the Great Smear Campaign" against himself andFWF would lead to the ending of Crozier's official links to MI5. A few days after theCIA/FWF story broke in the summer of 1975, Crozier claims to have had his lastmeeting with Sir Michael Hanley, head of MI5 and the MI5 Director of Counter-Subversion, Dirk Hampden - Crozier, pg 114. However, in April 1976, Crozier's NAFFwould publish a controversial article by "a recently retired counter-subversion chiefof MI5" – if not Hampden, then his successor, Charles Elwell, with whom Crozierwould work after Elwell's retirement in 1982.(198) Crozier, pg 118.(199) The Scotsman, 8/8/77.(200) NAFF was renamed the Freedom Association in January 1979. The FAcontinued with many of NAFF's personnel; Norris McWhirter was FA Chairman,Ivens FA Vice-President, both being on the editorial committee of Freedom Today, theFA journal. Until April 1989, Crozier also served on the Freedom Today editorialcommittee. Robert Moss remained NAFF/FA Director until 1981. FA Board membersincluded the ISC's Vice-Admiral Sir Louis Le Bailly, SIF's Gerald Howarth andRhodes Boyson, and Professor R.V. Jones who served with the ISC's LeonardSchapiro and G. K. Young in the group set up to reorganize MI6 in the 1950s. FAwould use the same tactics of legal action against strikers that NAFF had used in1976, most notably during the 1984 miners' strikes leading to the foundation of thebreakaway Union of Democratic Mineworkers.(201) The Great White Hoax, pgs 59-60.(202) Time Out, 8/7/77.(203) Crozier, pg 118.(204) Ramsay and Dorril, pg 15.(205) Dorril and Ramsay (1991), pg 288.(206) Chalfont had excellent security and intelligence contacts such as JeremyWetherell, formerly a member of K5, MI5’s Soviet Counter-Espionage department. Inthe 1980s, Wetherell would work for the private detective agency Zeus, founded byChalfont and Sir James Goldsmith, which was involved in political surveillanceactivities on behalf of the nuclear power industry - see Observer, 29/1/89.(207) Crozier, pgs 127-129.(208) Crozier, pgs 114 and 118.(209) Grau had previously worked with the NPD within a group set up for the1972 parliamentary elections - see Hirsch, pg 313; Hirsch is an excellent andexhaustive encyclopaedia of the German Right which gives further details on manyof the Germans mentioned in this book. On Grau and his groups, see YoungEuropean Federalists, pgs 158, 167, 208-214, 265 et seq. including its annex of ISPdocuments; Unheimliche Patrioten, pgs 427-442; IGfM, pgs 78-79; Hirsch.(210) Unheimliche Patrioten, pgs 433-435.(211) Unheimliche Patrioten, pgs 428-429.(212) Unheimliche Patrioten, pg 589.(213) Fiche et Fouine, ça suffit No. 1, February 1990, the journal of the Comité Enfinir avec l'Etat-fouineur (Stop the Snooper State Committee), founded after aparliamentary inquiry revealed the existence of a longstanding secret political policedepartment within the DJPF, the Swiss Justice and Police Ministry. A secondparliamentary inquiry into the DMF, the Swiss Ministry of Defence, uncovered twosecret components of the Gladio network in Switzerland, the armed resistance groupP26 and the intelligence group P27. P26 worked closely with MI6 who had createdGladio's European operational basis. The last secret agreement between MI6 andP26 was signed in 1987, three years before the parliamentary inquiry. See backnumbers of Fiche et Fouine, ça suffit and the Committee's book SchnüffelstaatSchweiz (Snooper State Switzerland).(214) Colonel Schmid would commit suicide in February 1981 when faced with ajudicial inquiry into his collaboration with Cincera.(215) Non-Swiss readers should note that as Switzerland has compulsory militaryservice and places rigorous restrictions on conscientious objection, almost all Swissmen will have an Army personnel file.(216) Abendland, March 1981, quoted in Unheimliche Patrioten, pg 670; Fiche etFouine, ça suffit No. 1, February 1990; Schnüffelstaat Schweiz, pgs 133-137. For arésumé of "the Cincera affair" and "the MIDONAS affair", see Unheimliche Patrioten;the revelations were published at the time in three brochures by the DemocraticManifesto, Dossier Cincera (1976), Dossier DM-Prozess (1977) and Cincera als Cäsar:wir waren Cinceras Berner Spitzel (1977).(217) In 1983, Cincera would be elected to the National Council, the SwissParliament, at the same time as Dr Peter Sager of SOI; the two men would worktogether on the Parliamentary Committee on the Media - see Unheimliche Patrioten,pg 676. Cincera would serve on the National Council until 1995; he died in 2004.Sager would serve on the National Council until 1991; from 1984 to 1991, he wasalso a Swiss representative at the Strasbourg-based Council of Europe. Sager wouldbecome the leading pro-Contra propagandist in Switzerland; his VereinigungDemokratischer Nicaragua (VDN, Association for a Democratic Nicaragua) was one ofthe main outlets for anti-Sandinista disinformation in Europe in the mid-1980s.Sager was particularly useful for the Contras due to his rôle within the Council ofEurope; in 1984, he headed a Council of Europe delegation to Nicaragua. In 1985,he was part of a Swiss National Council delegation that strongly condemned theSandinistas after their return to Switzerland. On 16/2/86, Sager founded the VDNtogether with Contras Evenor Valdivia and Jaime Pasquier and industrialistAlexander Eugster. In March 1986, Sager travelled with a second Swiss NationalCouncil delegation to Nicaragua, and on 31/5/86, the VDN gave a press conferencewith CIA agent Roberto Ferrey. In 1986, Sager's pro-Contra book, Case Study ofSlander - media manipulation by Nicaragua, Propagandists in Switzerland waspublished by SOI. The SOI would close due to a lack of funding in 1994, thirty-fiveyears after its foundation; Sager died in 2006. On Sager, see IGfM, pgs 63-64; DieContra Connection, pgs 84-87, 245; Dorril and Ramsay, 1990, pg 6; UnheimlichePatrioten.(218) Unheimliche Patrioten, pg 437.(219) Unheimliche Patrioten, pgs 431 and 593.(220) On Löwenthal and his various groups, see IGfM; Young European Federalists;Hirsch. Together with Huyn, Löwenthal has also served as a major German linkmanfor WACL and CAUSA, the political arm of the Moonies; Löwenthal frequentlyattended international conferences organized by WACL and CAUSA, such as thejoint WACL/CAUSA congress hosted by Stroessner and Pinochet in Asuncion,Paraguay in 1981. On WACL and CAUSA (the Confederation for the Association andUnity of Society in the Americas), see Anderson and Anderson; Boyer; Die ContraConnection. Löwenthal was also a Member of Honour of the "freedom fighters"alliance, Resistance International (see footnote 320), and an Honorary Member of theBoard of the right-wing students' group Hochschulring Tübinger Studenten whichhad links to the neo-nazi Wehrsportgruppe Hoffmann - Spiegel, 41/1980, pg 31, andHirsch, pg 406. Löwenthal died in 2002.(221) Stern, 8/1978.(222) Ramsay and Dorril; Crozier, pg 102.(223) Observer, 10/2/91. Keston has certainly been the major British outlet for thiskind of disinformation with excellent contacts to the BBC World Service: Keston'sJane Ellis did three "Words of Faith" programmes for the World Service in November1990 which were nothing less than a party political broadcast for a newly-formedChristian Democrat party in the Soviet Union. Three years later, Crozier revealed inhis memoirs who exactly was behind the new party: "In 1990, taking advantage ofglasnost, the NTS had emerged as a Christian Democrat opposition party. It wasallowed to hold meetings in Russia and a USSR-wide congress in Leningrad inNovember 1990" – Crozier, pg 271. The head of the BBC World Service in 1990, JohnTusa, had been company secretary of Forum World Features in 1966-67, resigningover editorial disputes with Crozier, unaware of FWF's CIA links. See Crozier, pgs 70-71 and 73; Ramsay and Dorril, pgs 4 and 34; Guardian, 31/12/76 and 11/10/89.(224) The IGfM/ISHR should not be confused with the legitimate Paris-basedhuman rights organisation, the Fédération Internationale des Droits de l’Homme(FIDH).(225) Crozier, pg 124.(226) On Horchem, see Spiegel, 36/1981, pg 16; Crozier; Various authors (IFF), pgsviii-ix.(227) ISC advert for the Annual in Conflict Study no. 60, August 1975.(228) ISC Annual of Power and Conflict 1974-75, pg 16.(229) Spiegel, 10/80, pg 23 et seq.; Roth and Ender.(230) Yallop, pg 456; State Research no. 15, Dec 1979 - Jan 1980, pgs 50-51.(231) Retinger, pg 212; State Research no. 15, Dec 1979 - Jan 1980, pgs 50-51.(232) Two other participants at the 1974 Bilderberg conference would soon set upgroups within the complex: George Ball, Chairman of the US Committee of the ISC,founded in March 1975, and Sir Frederic Bennett of SIF, a founding member ofNAFF in July 1975 - Gonsalez-Mata, pgs 21, 27 and 312-315, who gives the 1974Bilderberg participants list.(233) Frankfurter Rundschau, 13/9/63 reproduced in IGfM, pg 75.(234) Gonsalez-Mata, pg 107.(235) On Lageneste, see Faligot and Krop, pgs 334-335.(236) Péan, pg 242. Habsburg has lived in Spain and Portugal for much of the time- both are former possessions of the Habsburg empire. For Habsburg's Portugueseconnections, see his biography in IGfM, pg 59-60.(237) See Günter Walraff in Stern, 7/4/76 and Libération, 9-10 + 11/4/76, and hisDie Aufdeckung einer Verschwörung.(238) Die Contra Connection, pg 164. The HSS published a celebration of sixteenyears of cooperation with the Fundacion Canovas del Castillo in its Informationen1/2 1995 (pg 14), which quoted HSS Chairman Alfred Bayer: "Over the past sixteenyears we have held no less than 7,350 seminars with over 335,000 participants, over80% of which [were organised] in cooperation with the Fundacion". Bayer and theFundacion's head, Carlos Robles Piquer, were received by King Juan Carlos as partof the 1995 celebration. Robles Piquer was Fraga Iribarne's brother-in-law and hadtwice served under him, firstly in the 1960s as Director-General of Information,Fraga's top civil servant and main contact of Crozier's when Fraga was Minister (seeCrozier, pg 72), and then again in the first post-Franco government of December1975 – July 1976 when Fraga was Vice-President and Interior Minister and RoblesPiquer was Minister for Education and Science. Having become President of theAlianza Popular in 1976, Fraga Iribarne would be official Leader of the Oppositionfrom 1982, when AP became the second strongest party in Spain, until 1986 whenhe resigned from AP. In 1989, Fraga Iribarne would refound AP as the PartidoPopular, serving as its Honorary President and selecting future Prime Minister JoseMaria Aznar as PP's President. Withdrawing from national politics, Fraga Iribarnewas then elected President of the Region of Galicia in 1990, a post he held until2005. After his 2005 regional election defeat, he was selected to represent theGalician Parliament in the Senate, a post reconfirmed in 2008. As for Silva Munoz,having joined Fraga's Alianza Popular in 1976, he would soon leave to undertake afailed attempt to unite the Spanish extreme Right on a joint ticket with Blas Pinar inthe 1979 elections. On post-Franco politics, see the useful Diccionario de laTransicion, Victoria Prego, Plaza & Janes, Barcelona 1999.(239) The Service de Documentation, de Renseignements et d'Action, a branch ofthe Army’s Service Général de Renseignements. Part, at least, of the Gladio networkin Belgium was run by SDRA-8.(240) Brewaeys and Deliège, pg 58.(241) See Blackstock; Churchill and Vander Wall, 1988 and 1990.(242) Churchill and Vander Wall, 1988, pg xiv.(243) It is interesting to note that one of PIO's Press contacts was René Haquin, thejournalist whose book Des taupes dans l'extrême droite - la Sûreté de l'Etat et le WNPfirst exposed the Latinus/Smets story, detailed in a later chapter. It appears withhindsight that Latinus's fascist militia WNP served to entrap Smets and other Sûretéofficers investigating de Bonvoisin and the extreme Right, and that it wassubsequently deliberately blown by its members to discredit the Sûreté - this wouldexplain the revealing interviews Latinus gave Haquin for his book. Haquin gotsucked in and became as much an actor in parapolitical developments as a reporterof them; it would seem that Haquin was at least unwittingly manipulated intoblowing the gaffe and sinking the Sûreté's investigations. Haquin's association withPIO several years previous to the WNP scandal may however indicate a less innocentinvolvement. Haquin, having paved the way, subsequently withdrew from furtherinvestigation into the extreme Right and returned to his previous field of crimereporting.(244) Bougerol in conversation with Philippe Brewaeys.(245) See Anderson and Anderson.(246) Interview with Ray Cline by Alan de Francovitch and the BBC team preparingthe programme Gladio Story, quoted by Bouffioux in Télémoustique, 23/4/92 – thisexperience may explain PIO's English-language title. On Cline, see notably Hermanand O'Sullivan who cover his later career as a disinformationist in depth.(247) Brewaeys and Deliège, pg 55.(248) Brewaeys and Deliège, pg 118.(249) Covert Action Information Bulletin, no. 10, Aug-Sept 1980, pg 37.(250) Boyer, pg 283.(251) See Cooley.(252) On de Borchgrave and the joint Moss/de Borchgrave group MARA, see Boyer;Lobster no. 19, pg 20; Herman and O'Sullivan; Brewaeys and Deliège.(253) Prominent Flemish journalist Walter de Bock investigated Latinus in depth ina series of articles entitled Latinus, de spiderman, published in De Morgen, 1-12/7/89, and collected and translated into French as a special issue of CelsiuS,December 1991.(254) Damman's misspelling of Bougerol's name is no indication of a lack of contactbetween Damman and Bougerol at this stage - the same Chapter participants' listincludes Damman's misspelling "Totossy"; Töttösy had been in touch with Dammansince at least 1961.(255) Eringer, pg 50.(256) Van Doorslaer and Verhoeyen, pgs 150-154; Willan, pgs 107-100.(257) During his period at NATO in the 1950s and 1960s, Brosio also attended theconferences of the Bilderberg group, such as the October 1957 conference at Fiuggidevoted to security within NATO (also attended by Cord Meyer) and theextraordinary Bilderberg conference convened in Wiesbaden in March 1966 to dealwith the urgent question of a reorganization of NATO. The latter conference was alsoattended by Pinay, the then Secretary of State George Ball and a future DeputyDirector of the CIA, General Vernon Walters – later all Cercle associates. SeeGonsalez-Mata, pgs 27 and 58; Eringer, pg 45.(258) Information from Jeff Bale; Willan, pgs 107-110. For a fictionalized account ofthe various coup attempts in Italy, see Morris West's The Salamander, WilliamHeinemann, London 1973. As for Brosio, in March 1975, he attended a conferenceon European security organized by the Centro Italiano di Documentazione e AzioneSociale (CIDAS) which included amongst its participants Gianno Accame, a formerItalian correspondent of Aginter Press, and General Diulio Fanali of ISSED,implicated in the Borghese coup and the Rosa dei Venti conspiracy - Laurent, pg304.(259) Cornwell, pg 90.(260) Cornwell, pgs 166-167.(261) The loan taken by Pesenti was only one of the extremely complex financialtransactions by Calvi which allowed him to steal $250 million for P2. The mostrecent and comprehensive account of the Banco Ambrosiano is given by therespected financial journalist Charles Raw, who details Pesenti's relationship withBanco Ambrosiano. See Raw, pgs 91-92 for this episode.(262) Péan, pg 90. Nothing is known of the Edicercle project - one possibility isindicated in footnote 322 below.(263) Péan, pg 91.(264) Péan, pg 92.(265) Crozier makes no mention of FARI or of BOSS in his memoirs, no doubtbecause of the sensitive issue of covert South African funding.(266) Coxsedge, Coldicut and Harant, pg 124; Guardian, 11/2/83.(267) Guardian, 6/5/80 and 11/2/83; Ramsay and Dorril, pgs 4-5 and 40; StateResearch no. 7, Aug/Sept 1978; Observer, 29/1/89; Dorril and Ramsay (1991);Toczek; Herman and O'Sullivan, pg 269, note 62.(268) Christie (1982), pgs 126-127.(269) The Great White Hoax, pg 32.(270) Annex of ISP documents in Young European Federalists.(271) Winter (1981), pgs 543-544.(272) Dorril and Ramsay (1991), pg 365, note 10; Foot.(273) The 4th Lord St Oswald, D.L., M.C., whose plebian name was Rowland Winn,had reported on the Spanish Civil War for Reuters and the Daily Telegraph beforeserving with the SOE in Albania and Thailand from 1940 to 1945. He would latervolunteer for service in Korea from 1950 to 1952, winning a Military Cross. Afterdemobilisation and having inherited his title in 1957, he sat as a Conservative Peerin the House of Lords until his death in 1984, serving as a government whip from1959 to 1962 and Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture from1962 to 1964. One regular focus of his was on Poland - in 1971-72, he wouldcampaign with Airey Neave for British official recognition of the 1940 Katynmassacre as a Soviet war crime, serving with Neave as Deputy Chairmen of theKatyn Memorial Fund, one of whose patrons was Winston Churchill MP. From 1973until the first direct elections in 1979, he would sit as an appointed MEP in theEuropean Parliament. Apart from his parliamentary career, Lord St Oswald was alsoVice-President of Stewart-Smith’s Foreign Affairs Circle – see Lobster 19 (May 1990),pg 7. He wrote the introduction for Joseph Josten's Unarmed Combat, 1973, firstpublished in Contributions to Conflict Studies, Markus Verlag, Köln, which alsoquoted SOI and Sager, and also provided the introduction for The Soviet Threat toPeace, published jointly by Foreign Affairs and Markus Verlag, which includedcontributions by Brzezinski and Ball. The Markus Verlag (Press) in Cologne, whichoperated between 1951 and c. 1994, seems to have been a significant Germanlanguagedisinformation outlet; according to its German Wikipedia entry, "theMarkus Press was specialized in political propaganda books on military policy andthe Eastern Block, sometimes published in close cooperation with the FederalInterior Ministry and the Federal Defence Ministry ... The Press was the publisherfrom 1951 to 1973 of the illustrated magazine of the Federal Border Protection Force... From 1971 to 1990, the Press published the magazine Beiträge zurKonfliktforschung – Psychopolitische Aspekte (Contributions to Conflict Studies –Psychopolitical Aspects), launched by General Johannes Gerber which was fundedby the Federal Defence Ministry and set itself the task of acting as a counterweightto the generally pacifist-inclined peace research of the day."(274) Crozier, pg 193.(275) Career information from Joel van der Reijden. Tennant died in 1996. Tennantwould later play a significant part assisting the mid-1980s anti-disarmamentpropaganda operations run by Cercle/6I associates – see below. Van der Reijden alsonotes that Tennant was a member of the Academic Council of Wilton Park. It isunclear whether Tennant was ever active within CEDI; his name does not appear ona 1972 list of CEDI office-holders, which does however name other British CEDImembers besides Agnew and Rodgers: the Rt. Hon. Geoffrey Rippon, Minister forEurope (Monday Club member from at least 1970 on, participant at the 1974Bilderberg conference in Megèze together with Frederic Bennett and GeraldThompson of Kleinwort Benson); the Rt. Hon. Sir Frederick Corfield, QC, MP, formerminister; Sir Denys Lowson, Bt, investment banker; Francis Bennett, Chief Whip;Kenneth Clarke MP, later a Bilderberger. CEDI's 1972 General Assembly was held inLondon. Francis Bennett, Alderman QLC, would attend this 1976 CEDI Congress, aswould a certain Martin McLaren of London, and Bernard Woodford, Director, Witney,Oxfordshire.(276) Crozier, pg 193. Bach died in 2001. On Bach's involvement in the Northropbribes scandal, see Van der Reijden.(277) Van Doorslaer and Verhoeyen, pg 164.(278) On Jardim, see Laurent, pgs 153, 329, 335; Péan (1983), pg 149. On Kaulzade Arriaga, see the Sunday Times Insight team's book on the Portuguese revolution.(279) Crozier, pgs 127-128.(280) In 1988, Elliott proposed giving a posthumous honour to Philby as adeception operation to mislead the KGB. Elliott's career details are given in Dorriland Observer, 2/2/92. Elliott's memoirs are bizarrely- in reference to GeorgiMarkov? - entitled Never Judge a Man by his Umbrella (Michael Russel, Salisbury1991).(281) Crozier, pgs 129-130. Peter Shipley was a specialist on revolutionary groupsin Britain, and author of a March 1977 ISC Conflict Study, Trotskyism: ‘Entryism’and Permanent Revolution; he went on to do a spell in Thatcher's Cabinet Office,leaving in 1984 to rejoin the ISC.(282) Crozier, pg 137.(283) Pincher (1978), pgs 115 and 137-139; Ramsay and Dorril, pg 13. In February1977, during a heated Parliamentary debate, Hastings had also drawn the HomeSecretary's attention to the 'bias' in a World in Action television programme in favourof those journalists who had exposed the CIA funding of FWF. Hastings died in 2005.(284) Crozier, pg 128.(285) Crozier, pg 120.(286) Crozier, pg 128-129. The ISC had already dealt with subversion in educationand in the Churches: in March 1974, the ISC had produced a Conflict Study entitledMarxism and the Church of Rome, which was republished by Le Monde Moderne in1975. An ISC Study Group on subversion in higher education, which included DrKenneth Watkins of NAFF and Aims, started work in November 1975; its findingswould be published in September 1977 as an ISC Special Report, The Attack onHigher Education. From May 1977 to April 1978, an ISC Study Group would meet todiscuss on subversion in the media; the ISC Special Report Television and Conflictwould finally be published in November 1978 - see Crozier, pgs 150-155.(287) Crozier, pgs 137-138.(288) Crozier, pg 139.(289) Crozier, pg 138.(290) Crozier, pgs 139-140.(291) Crozier, pgs 131-133.(292) Crozier, pg 142.(293) Crozier, pg 144. The most likely contenders are MI5 Head of Counter-Subversion Dirk Hampden, Crozier's official liaison who retired sometime after thesummer of 1975 but seems not to have had a later private career, or alternativelyHampden's successor Charles Elwell, who wouldn't in fact retire until 1982 but whodid actually effect this crucial shift of operations from counter-espionage to countersubversionin the late 1970s; after retirement, Elwell would work with Crozierthroughout the 1980s.(294) Crozier, pg 133.(295) Crozier, pg 134.(296) For all quotes by Crozier on the 6I below, see Crozier, pg 135.(297) Biographical information on Romerstein, Kraemer and Holliday from Variousauthors (IFF), pgs v-xiii; on Romerstein, see Crozier, pg 11; on Kraemer, see Crozier,pg 185; for Holliday's quote from an IFF presentation he gave with Romerstein, seeVarious authors (IFF), pg 131.(298) Crozier, pg 135.(299) Crozier, pgs 135-136.(300) Crozier, pgs 180-181.(301) Crozier, pg 136.(302) Crozier, pg 136. Nothing more is known of Perriaux’s involvement in theCercle, which would certainly be worth investigating further.(303) Crozier, pg 187.(304) One of the enduring political lessons illustrated by this investigation is thatpurges of or restrictions on the security and intelligence services often simplydisplace rogue agents into the private sector as 'retirees'. The Cercle and 6I drewmuch of their support from intelligence veterans displaced following purges inGermany (1969), the UK and France (1970), the UK and the USA (1977) andBelgium (1978). As Wikipedia has commented on the Western Goals Foundation:"After the Watergate and COINTELPRO scandals of the early 1970s, several lawswere passed to restrict police intelligence gathering within political organizations.The laws tried to make it necessary to demonstrate that a criminal act was likely tobe uncovered by any intelligence gathering proposed. Many files on radicals,collected for decades, were ordered destroyed. The unintended effect of the lawswas to privatize the files in the hands of 'retired' intelligence officers and their mosttrusted, dedicated operatives".(305) Crozier, pgs 189-190.(306) Spiegel, No. 37/1982, and Roth and Ender, pgs 57-58. Hans ChristophSchenk Freiherr von Stauffenberg, who died in Munich in 2005, was a member ofthe junior branch of the von Stauffenberg family, being the son of Reichstag Nazi MPFranz Wilhelm Karl Maria Gabriel Schenk Freiherr von Stauffenberg.(307) In Germany, party foundations distribute grants from the Ministry forcooperation and Development to 'deserving partners' in the Third World, and are animportant and official component in political parties' foreign policy bodies.(308) Spiegel, 10/1980, pgs 26-27; Spiegel-Buch, pgs 118-119. Handwritten noteson the original are revealing: "GS/BK/HSS" indicates that the document should bepassed to the CSU General Secretariat, the Strauss newspaper Bayern Kurier andthe Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung itself. Several countries are underlined by hand in theoriginal: Nigeria, Turkey, Manila, Hong Kong, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. A furthercountry not mentioned was Angola. On the 16th October, 1976, Straussaccompanied by CDU MP and foreign and defence policy spokesman Dr WernerMarx met Holden Roberto in the backroom of the Munich pub "Franziskaner"; theFNLA leader wanted Strauss's help in unfreezing arms shipments promised byKissinger - Spiegel, 10/1980; Spiegel-Buch, pg 119. On HSS activities, see Die ContraConnection; Spiegel, 9/1980, 10/1980; Tageszeitung, 24/1/87, 16/3/87, 13/5/87,18/5/87, 20/5/87, 22/5/87, 6/6/87, 12/6/87, 3/7/87; Lobster 14, September1987, pg 33.(309) Péan, pgs 76-77.(310) Crozier, pg 125.(311) Péan, pgs 72-74.(312) Mungo, pg 24.(313) Mungo, pg 26.(314) Mungo, pg 27. Keston College had earlier contributed to this campaign forreligious freedom in the Soviet Union: "After a World Council of Churches meeting inNairobi in 1975, there was a request for the pooling of resources to producedocumentation on religion in Eastern Europe. This was eventually published underthe title Religious Liberty in the Soviet Union (published by Keston College, Kent,England, a centre for the study of religion and communism, and edited by the Rev.Michael Bourdeaux)" – Deacon, pgs 69-70. On Deacon, see this author and RobinRamsay’s piece Truth Twisting: notes on disinformation in Lobster 19 (May 1990) pgs20-22.(315) On the Brüsewitz Centre, see IGfM, pgs 69-70, Young European Federalists,pgs 188-214, and Hirsch. Habsburg's youngest daughter, now Walburga HabsburgDouglas, would play an active part in her father's political life from a very early age.In 1973, at the age of fifteen, she would be co-founder of the German PEU youthwing, Paneuropa-Jugend Deutschland; at the age of nineteen, she was co-founder ofthe Christian Paneuropean Study Group and the Brüsewitz Centre before going onto study law and canonical law in Salzburg. She would then work with her father inthe European Parliament from 1979 until 1992 with a spell in 1983 studyingjournalism in the National Journalism Centre in Washington and working in theWashington office of Readers' Digest. From 1985 to 1992 she worked as InformationCounsellor in the Information Ministry of the Sultanate of Oman, and from 2004 onsat on the Board of the Arab International Media Forum in London. She would nothowever neglect the PEU, serving as PEU Deputy International Secretary-Generalfrom 1980 to 1988, PEU International Secretary-General from 1988 to 2004, andsince then as PEU International Executive Vice-President. In August 1989, she andher father would be key organisers of the Paneuropean Picnic which punctured theIron Curtain and accelerated the fall of the Berlin Wall, described below. In 1992,she married the Swedish Count Archibald Douglas and became active in theSwedish Moderata samlingspartiet, standing on their list for the EuropeanParliament in 1999 and 2004, and for the Swedish Parliament in 2002 and 2006,when she was finally elected. Since 2006, she sits on the Swedish Parliament'sForeign Affairs Committee.(316) Spiegel, 9/11/87. On Colonia Dignidad, see below. Roth and Ender add (pg79) that Bossle and Huyn served on the Presidium of a Deutsch-chilenischerFreundeskreis (German-Chilean Friendship Circle).(317) Die Contra Connection, pg 258. Pachmann was also an author for the Moonienewspaper Integral.(318) Roth and Ender, pg 62; IGfM, pg 80; Van der Reijden; Huyn bibliography. Thelatter book includes different information on Huyn's European Conference, citing asa source "Résumé of the Founding Meeting of the European Conference on HumanRights, Lucerne 1-3/3/74"; the Conference probably changed title before Huyn's1977 publication mentioned here.(319) For biographies of Bossle, Blumenwitz and Rohrmoser, see IGfM, pgs 59, 63and 65. Bossle would die in 2000, Blumenwitz in 2005, Rohrmoser in September2008 – see Rohrmoser's obituary in Die Welt, 18/9/08. In 1981, Rohrmoser wouldwork with the Federal Government on a publication covering the philosophical basesof terrorism; in 1987-88, he would work several times as speaker for the Germansection of CAUSA. On Colonia Dignidad and its links to DINA, see Gero Gemballa'sColonia Dignidad, Rowohlt rororo aktuell, Reinbek bei Hamburg 1990, pgs 148-151.The legal proceedings against Amnesty International's German section would run formore than twenty years and would trigger a Chilean court inspection in 1988,leading to a Chilean government decision to close Colonia Dignidad in February1991 - see Guardian, 24-25/8/91. Blumenwitz' Chile – Rückfahrt zur Demokratie(Chile – Return to Democracy) would be published by the IfD in 1987. On DINA'sWashington assassination of Orlando Letelier, see John Dinges and Saul Landau'sAssassination on Embassy Row (Pantheon, New York 1980; McGraw-Hill, New York1981); Taylor Branch and Eugene Propper's Labyrinth (Penguin, London 1983). OnDINA's international cooperation within Operation Condor, see John Dinges'sexcellent The Condor Years (New Press, New York 2004). On DINA's 1975 productionof nerve-gas using precursor chemicals purchased from Britain, see Observer,23/4/89.(320) On Lobkowicz, see IGfM, pg 62; Die Contra Connection. ResistanceInternational was active throughout the 1980s, defending the Nicaraguayan Contras,the Afghan mujaheddin, RENAMO in Mozambique and Jonas Savimbi’s AngolanUNITA. Several Cercle associates signed two RI appeals widely published in theinternational press, one in March 1985 just before Reagan imposed a trade embargoon Nicaragua (Close, Huyn, Lobkowicz, von Hassel, Graf von Stauffenberg, Bukovskyand Crozier), and another in October 1987 (Close, Löwenthal, Lobkowicz, von Hassel,Graf von Stauffenberg, Bukovsky, Crozier and Stewart-Smith) – see Die ContraConnection, pgs 264-267. Löwenthal was also a German Member of Honour of RI;RI's American Members of Honour included former US Ambassador to the UN JeaneKirkpatrick, Midge Decter, a personal friend of Reagan's and Chair of the Committeefor a Free World (on which see State Research no.22, February-March 1981, pgs 88-90), and WACL President General Singlaub, a former Chief of Staff of US forces inSouth Korea until 1977 and then Chief of Staff of the Army Forces Command. Aclose collaborator of Col. Oliver North, Singlaub would be one of the major playersimplicated in the Irangate scandal. On Resistance International, see Die ContraConnection and IGfM; on Singlaub, see below, Bellant and Crozier. Crozier would playa considerable part in the anti-Sandinista campaign in the UK, working within theCommittee for a Free Nicaragua – see Die Contra Connection pgs 90-91 and Lobsterno.16 (July 1988), pg 18.(321) Mungo, pg 24 et seq.(322) The Vice-President of CLEW was Egidio Ortona, host for the foundingceremony and President of the Italian branch set up in 1977. A former ItalianAmbassador to the US, Ortona was a founding member of the Trilateral Commissionand served on its Executive Committee in 1979 as European Chairman – seeEringer. The other members of CLEW were Sir Heinz Koeppler, former Rector ofWilton Park, Düsseldorf lawyer Klaus F. Beckmann, Doctor Georges Ladame,President of the Swiss Society of Friends of Wilton Park, and Jean J. Richard, Vice-President of the International Society of Wilton Park - see Mungo. The statutes ofCLEW also mention an offshoot of Wilton Park called the European DiscussionCentre (E. D. C.), which may be the same as the "Edicercle" mentioned by Violet inhis message to Damman of 31st March, 1976 about the funding crisis of theAcademy. Van der Reijden also notes that Sir Peter Tennant of the Cercle was amember of the Academic Council of Wilton Park.(323) The 1978 AESP membership list published by Mungo is also reproduced inGijsels (1991), pgs 152-157. An earlier internal membership list dating from around1977 already included many of the new names in the AESP in 1978, listing Huyn,van den Heuvel, Vallet and Valori as members of the core organising group, thePermanent Delegation, whilst Soustelle, Biggs-Davison, Agnew, Rodgers, Pirkl andGraf von Stauffenberg figured as AESP Life Members, and Grau, de Bonvoisin,Vigneau, Marique, Magnino, Schneider and Bitsonau served as AESP Study Groupmembers.(324) This von Stauffenberg, only distantly related to the Freiherr von Stauffenbergwho ran the CSU’s private intelligence network, was part of the main branch of thevon Stauffenberg lineage, being the third son of Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenbergwho with his brother Berthold was executed in 1944 for plotting to kill Hitler. Incontrast to the parliamentary information given here, taken from Wikipedia, a CDUPensioners Union information sheet from 2008 states that von Stauffenberg was aGerman Federal MP from 1972 to 1984 before being elected to the EuropeanParliament.(325) Le Soir, 4/9/91 and Brewaeys and Deliège, pgs 62-63 quoted from the SenateGladio Commission findings. No details are known of the "Saoud affair", but thereference is intriguing. In the spring of 1978, Crozier had met the recently-appointedhead of the Saudi intelligence service, Prince Turki ben Faisal, and briefed him onthe 6I and its activities - could that be what Fagnart refers to?(326) On PIO, Bougerol, de Bonvoisin, Latinus, De Roover and the Belgian Gladionetwork, see Histoire de glaives, Michel Bouffioux, published in Gladio (pgs 29-60);Michel Bouffioux in Libertés, 9, 10, 11, 13-15, 17, 18, 19 and 20-22/4/91 (Libertéswas a short-lived Belgian left-wing daily which appeared from March to June, 1991)and in Télémoustique, 27/6/91; Le Soir, 4/9/91; Gijsels (1991); Brewaeys andDeliège.(327) The hostages were released five minutes after Reagan's inauguration onJanuary 20th, 1981; Reagan's first Presidential address was to announce theirliberation. On the "October Surprise", see Reagan campaign assistant BarbaraHonegger's October Surprise (Tudor, NY 1989); An Election held Hostage? ACompendium, ed. David Marks (Fund for New Priorities in America, NY 1991) whichincludes many declassified documents; Sick, a cautious but conclusive investigationby a National Security Council staffer under Presidents Ford, Carter and Reagan,principal White House aide for Iran during the 1979-81 hostage crisis, and later ofColumbia University, New York.(328) Sick, pg 149. "One example [of Brenneke's inside knowledge] was hisstatement to a DIA official on 3rd January, 1986, that 'Admiral Poindexter had givenpermission to sell 10,000 missiles to Iran'. On that date, a draft presidential findingwas being prepared ... that provided for the sale of TOW missiles to Iran. PresidentReagan signed the finding on 6th January" - Sick, pg 210. Sick devotes several pagesto discussing Brenneke's claims and reliability; for other accounts of his claims, seeRoth; Gijsels (1991).(329) All information on P7 and the Comité Hongrie 1956-76 from Gijsels (1991),pgs 91-96. Töttösy also worked directly with Habsburg and Jacques Jonet within theAssociation Europe Hongrie, a right-wing Catholic group set up in 1990. The AEHbrought together bankers, industrialists and politicians with the aim of promotingindustrial and commercial development in Hungary. The AEH's task was madeeasier by Habsburg's rôle as Chairman or Deputy Chairman of the EuropeanParliament's Delegation for Relations with Hungary from 1989 to 1999. See CelsiuS39 (April 1991), pgs 3-4.(330) Crozier, pg 172. Albertini would die in 1983 – see his biography in van derReijden. There are two works on Albertini, neither of which I have yet obtained:L'Homme de l'Ombre – Georges Albertini 1911-1993 (surely a misprint for 1983],Laurent Lemire, Ed. Balland, 1989, and Le Dossier Georges Albertini – une intelligenceavec l'ennemi, Jean Lévy, Ed. L'Harmattan-Le Pavillon, 1992. Lévy, who worked forCelsiuS, was interviewed about his book in CelsiuS no. 52 (August-September 1992).(331) Listed in Huyn's bibliography.(332) People's News Service, 6/2/79, pg 3.(333) Ramsay and Dorril, pg 53. The previous year, du Plessis's report, Moscow'sControl over Mozambique and Angola, had been published by Stewart-Smith's East-West Digest (no. 23, 1977). The ISC would return to the significance of South Africafor the West's oil supply in a May 1979 ISC Special Report, The Security of MiddleEast Oil.(334) On Freedom Blue Cross, see Rees and Day, pgs 196-197; State Research no.7 (Aug-Sept 1978) pgs 130-132 and no. 16 (Feb-March 1980) pg 71. Gonsalez-Mata,writing with less direct information a year after the Brighton conference, gives aslightly different take, seeing Freedom Blue Cross as the reactionary rump of a"cleansed" post-Lockheed Bilderberg Group: having described "... the reorganisationof the Bilderberg Group rid of its "black sheep", politicians, bankers andindustrialists belonging to right-wing organisations which cannot be integrated,reserve officers, former intelligence chiefs, etc", Gonsalez-Mata adds in a footnote:"These marginalized sectors would set up in London a new organisation, "worthysuccessor to the Bilderberg Club of heroic times" (sic), called Freedom Blue Crosswhose main aim is to "hinder Soviet expansionism in Europe, Asia, Africa and LatinAmerica" " – see Gonsalez-Mata, pg 297. The two DoI front groups, the FAA, chargedwith European and American outreach, and the SAFF, mostly active within SouthAfrica itself, would be closed down shortly after the Brighton conference followingtheir exposure in the media - People's News Service, 6/2/79, pg 3.(335) Crozier, pg 167.(336) Crozier, pg 171.(337) Michael Goodwin later became a financial adviser to the InternationalAssociation for Cultural Freedom which took over from the CIA-funded Congress forCultural Freedom. Ian Greig died in 1995.(338) Crozier, pgs 187-188.(339) Crozier, pg 188.(340) Crozier, pg 157.(341) The Dulverton Trust provided the ISC with a grant of £50,000 in 1978 -Crozier, pg 174.(342) On Turki ben Faisal and the mujaheddin, see Cooley, an outstanding book;US and the Taliban: a done deal, Pierre Abramovici, Le Monde Diplomatique, Englishedition, January 2002. After his London posting, ben Faisal would serve aslongstanding Saudi Ambassador in Washington.(343) See Haykal.(344) Crozier, pg 159.(345) Crozier, pg 161.(346) Many of Langemann's operations are described in Heigl and Saupe, whichunfortunately tells us nothing more about the Cercle Pinay.(347) “Hans von Machtenberg’s indiscretion [in providing Langemann withinformation on the Cercle] was nevertheless considered unacceptable, and the 6I’sdirectorate decided to sever relations with him. I was personally very sorry about thisrift, as I held Hans in high esteem”, Crozier pg 193.(348) Given in English in the original, this is no doubt Crozier's title for his secondattempt to get multinationals to fund the 6I after the failure of Freedom Blue Crossdescribed above.(349) Besides spelling his name wrong, Langemann also was wrong in calling deMarenches ex-Director; he would remain Director of SDECE until 1981.(350) It is interesting to note that Franks was Bonn station chief at the time of theSpiegel's initial allegations about Strauss in 1963 - see Dorril.(351) Born in 1921, Luchsinger was chief editor of the influential Swiss dailynewspaper Neue Zürcher Zeitung from January 1968 to January 1985. Havingstudied at Yale in 1951-52, Luchsinger joined the NZZ and would work as its Bonncorrespondent from 1955 to 1963 when Strauss and von Merkatz were FederalMinisters; he would then serve as head of the NZZ foreign desk before becomingchief editor in 1968. According to his biography in van der Reijden, Luchsingerwould receive the Freedom Prize in 1985, the year of his retirement, and was amember of the Löwenthal-Pachmann-Horchem group Konservative Aktion, theIGfM/ISHR, Resistance International, WACL, CAUSA, the Jonathan Institute, andthe European Institute on Security, the latter no doubt the EIS detailed below.(352) This is probably the Dr Stefan Kux whose Europe's Neutral States: Partners orProfiteers in Western Security? was published by the IEDSS in 1986. Colonel Bottawas Head of Procurement for the Swiss military intelligence service.(353) Langemann is confusing two prominent journalists called Löwenthal: thefriend - Gerhard, the Cercle contact obviously intended here, and the enemy -Richard, Professor of Foreign Policy at the Free University of Berlin, a close friend ofWilly Brandt; the two had worked together to formulate the opening to East Germanyand the Soviet Union under Ostpolitik that won Brandt the Nobel Peace Prize.(354) Spiegel, 37/1982, pgs 28-31, and Roth and Ender, pgs 58-60.(355) Crozier, pg 191.(356) Spiegel, 10/1980, pg 23; Spiegel-Buch, pg 109.(357) Spiegel, 12/1980.(358) Huyn, pg 258.(359) Whilst some Heritage/Cercle links are described below, the HeritageFoundation deserves more attention than can be given within the scope of thisstudy; Herman and O'Sullivan and Bellant are useful starting points.(360) Elected to Parliament in 1968, Filippo Maria Pandolfi served as Under-Secretary of State for Finance under Aldo Moro from 1974 to 1976 before becomingMinister of Finance and then Treasury Minister under Andreotti in 1978. Six monthsbefore this Cercle meeting, after the Italian elections in June 1979, Pandolfi hadtried to form a government after first Andreotti, then Socialist leader Craxi had failedto raise a workable majority. Pandolfi also failed; the new administration was formedby Christian Democrat Cossiga in August. Pandolfi would then serve as Minister forIndustry and Commerce from 1980 to 1983 and Minister for Agriculture andForestry from 1983 to 1988 before joining the European Commission as ItalianCommissioner and Commission Vice-President in charge of research anddevelopment from 1989 to 1993.(361) General Alan Fraser, South Africa's Consul-General in Iran and the Cercle'sintermediary for its contacts with the Shah as mentioned above.(362) When Langemann wrote this document in 1980, Pinay was already 88; hewould die on 13th December 1994, a fortnight short of his hundred and thirdbirthday. Later in 1980, Violet would himself hand over the organization of Cerclemeetings to Crozier and Franz Josef Bach - Crozier, pg 193. Bach had previouslyattended the December 1976 CEDI Congress in Madrid with Crozier, Violet, Pinayand Huyn.(363) Spiegel, 37/1982, pgs 28-31.(364) Crozier, pgs 192-193.(365) Prouty.(366) See Prouty, Appendix III for the full text.(367) See Valentine. Colby had attended the previous Cercle meeting one monthearlier in December 1979. Colby himself had had early experience in unconventionalwarfare - one little-known part of his CIA career was his involvement in setting upand training the the Gladio network in neutral Sweden and Finland and in the NATOmembers Norway and Denmark whilst stationed at the Stockholm CIA station in1951. Colby’s Scandinavian Gladio network would soon get into controversy – theSwedish network would be exposed in 1953 after the arrest of a right-wing militant,and in 1957, the director of the Norwegian secret service NIS, Vilhelm Evang, wouldstrongly protest against the domestic subversion of his country by the United Statesand NATO and would temporarily withdraw the Norwegian stay-behind army fromthe CPC Gladio coordination meetings. See the website of the Parallel History Projecton NATO and the Warsaw Pact (PHP), www.isn.ethz.ch/php, a cooperative researchproject run by the Center for Security Studies at ETH Zurich and the NationalSecurity Archive at the George Washington University on behalf of the PHP network.(368) Crozier, pg 177. In the late 1980s, Stilwell would serve on the Board of theMoonies' geostrategy offshoot, the US Global Strategy Council: chaired by Ray Cline,the USGSC's Board also included Richard Pipes of WISC and General Daniel O.Graham of the ASC. Besides Stilwell, the 6I could count on several contacts withinthe Reagan Administration: Reagan's first three National Security Advisers, DickAllen, Bud McFarlane and Admiral Poindexter, DCI Casey himself of course, and fourfurther friends: former NSIC Program Director and later IFF speaker Sven Kraemerwho dealt with arms control in the NSC; Ken deGraffenreid, Senior Director ofIntelligence Programs; WISC Board member and NSC adviser Richard Pipes; and lastbut not least Colonel Oliver North. Reagan would initially appoint an old Californianfriend, William A. Wilson, as his special contact for the Cercle and the 6I; Wilson wasappointed US Ambassador to the Vatican in 1982. See Crozier, pgs 184-186.(369) See Saunders.(370) Herman and O'Sullivan, pg 99.(371) Ironically, the Spiegel Affair had been triggered by Spanish InformationMinister Manuel Fraga Iribarne who gave a Press conference on 6th November 1962revealing the illegal extradition of Spiegel Chief Editor Conrad Ahlers, then onholiday in Spain, following a request from Bonn – see Spiegel-Buch, pg 126 et seq.Strauss and many of the leading public figures implicated in the Lockheed bribesscandal were members of the Bilderberg Group. For Lockheed-Bilderberg links, seethe two books on the Bilderberg Group mentioned above and the factual novel byBernt Engelmann.(372) Spiegel, 35/1980, pgs 22-25, and 36/1980, pg 250. Langemann alleged inanother report that the anti-Strauss campaign was "covertly coordinated" by the rivalnews magazines, Stern and Spiegel; he however made no mention of the Moscowangle: see Spiegel, 32/1982, pgs 30-31. On Löwenthal's continued support forStrauss in his ZDF Magazin programme, see Spiegel, 9/1983, pgs 104-106.(373) Sunday Times, 7/10/84.(374) Spiegel, 41/1984, pg 290, and Fallon, Chapter 25.(375) 6/3/85 issue.(376) The full-page adverts appeared in the Times, Daily Telegraph, Guardian,Financial Times, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and Die Welt. See Spiegel, 41/1984,pg 290, and 42/1984, pgs 3 and 290. A robust defence of Goldsmith's actions in theSpiegel case was included in Deacon; Goldsmith's own account was distributed bythe Monday Club.(377) Robert Moss's column in the Daily Telegraph would be a regular outlet forCercle disinformation. One report from Langemann to his minister's office dated 21stFebruary, 1980, revealed a further example of a Cercle-inspired article in the Britishpress and alluded to the CSU's private intelligence service, with which Langemannliaised closely: "The enclosed article ["The KGB's plans for the Games"] from the DailyTelegraph of 11/2/80, written by our friend Robert Moss, is the result of steps takentogether with the office of the Freiherr von Stauffenberg". Another occasion when theDaily Telegraph was used by Moss to plant propaganda came in August 1980 whenMoss recycled a CIA report in his Telegraph column. The CIA report, which allegedthat the Nicaraguan Sandinistas' final offensive against the dictator Somoza hadbeen planned by the Cuban General Staff, had been provided by "a senior member ofthe 6I in the Pentagon", probably General Stilwell, Reagan's Assistant Secretary ofDefence in charge of administration - see Crozier, pg 164.(378) It’s worth noting that George H.W. Bush’s brother Prescott S. Bush Jnr hadbeen a founding director of the NSIC with Barnett and Casey in 1962, and was stillserving as a member of its Advisory Council in 1984. Crozier had had theopportunity of "a long private talk" with George Bush a year before this Cerclemeeting when both men attended the July 1979 launch of the Jonathan Institute inJerusalem – see Crozier, pg 178.(379) Roth and Ender, pgs 89-90. The Cercle/6I had already assisted the Israelis ayear earlier at the July 1979 launch of the propaganda outlet, the Jonathan Institute– see below. Crozier reveals that the next Cercle meeting would be held in December1980 in Washington, a meeting attended by Carter's adviser on Soviet Affairs,Professor Marshall Shulman of Columbia University – see Crozier, pg 261. Crozieralso reveals another guest at that meeting: "At the Cercle meeting in Washington inDecember 1980, Georges Albertini had brought along a quiet Frenchman namedFrançois de Grossouvre. This was an impressive example of his foresight. DeGrossouvre, a physician, was the closest friend and confidant of the Socialist leaderand presidential candidate François Mitterrand. For many years, de Grossouvre hadcarried out special missions for Mitterrand. By nature and training, he was selfeffacing.He played no part in our debates, but listened carefully, taking notes. Fivemonths later, François Mitterrand narrowly defeated Valéry Giscard d'Estaing inFrance's presidential elections. One of his first actions was to appoint de Grossouvreas his coordinator of security and intelligence. Shortly after, having obtained hisdirect line from Albertini, I went to see him in his modest office in the Elysée Palace.We had reacted with alarm to Mitterrand's victory, but de Grossouvre reassured me"– Crozier, pgs 217-218.(380) Bellant, pg 32, which gives details of the ASC's election programme. TheASC's campaign included briefing or campaigning for 67 candidates; the two mainASC members involved were General Daniel O. Graham, Executive Director of theASC Political Action Committee and a former head of DIA and Deputy Director ofCIA, and General John Singlaub, Chairman of ASC's action arm, the Coalition forPeace through Strength, and World President of WACL, former CIA operative and acentral figure in the Irangate scandal.(381) Sick, pgs 110-111.(382) Woodward, pgs 39-41. At that time, although he did not know it, deMarenches himself had less than six months left as head of the SDECE; after elevenyears at the helm, the arch-conservative signalled his disapproval of the May 1981election of France's first post-war socialist government by resigning his post withouteven staying for his replacement's customary "breaking-in" period. De Marencheswas certain to be replaced; his covert manipulation of domestic politics had earnedhim the anger of Mitterrand's advisers. In 1978, Le Monde alleged that "under deMarenches's leadership, terrorism and also disinformation - the influencing of publicopinion - were extensively pursued [by the SDECE]" (Le Monde, 24/2/78). The rightwingin SDECE fiercely resisted Mitterrand; the Action Service rebelled, purgedSocialist sympathizers amongst the NCOs and refused to remove Giscard's portraitfrom the officers' mess. The rebellion of the Action Service centred around the divingbase in Aspretto, Corsica, from which the divers for the 1985 anti-Greenpeace"Operation Satanic" were drawn. The theory that the Greenpeace operation wasdeliberately blown (inter alia by drawing MI5's attention to the "covert" purchase of aZodiac boat in London and by leaving French Navy issue equipment at the scene) soas to sabotage the Socialist government (particularly Defence Minister CharlesHernu) draws substance from the identity of the "Operation Satanic" action team:the commander of the operation was Lt-Col Jean-Pierre Dillais, in 1981 rebel basecommander of Aspretto. The captured Capt. Alain Mafart was Dillais' deputy atAspretto and another of the ringleaders of the revolt. The team that actually laid thelimpet mines were all involved in the Aspretto revolt. See this author’s article FrenchVendetta in Lobster 16, July 1988.(383) Spiegel, 44/1983, pgs 76-78, 28/1986, pgs 36-39, and 42/86; Die Zeit,24/06/83 Nr. 26.(384) All uncredited information in the section on the Belgian strategy of tension istaken from Gijsels, L'Enquête which, despite certain inaccuracies and no index, isthe best overview of Belgium from a parapolitical perspective. Brief biographies ofCEPIC figures can be found in a supplement to CelsiuS 29, May 1990. Other bookson the rumours of a coup in 1973, the strategy of tension in the 1980s and theextreme right in Belgium are de Bock; Haquin; Willems; Dupont and Ponsaers; DeBende Tapes, various authors; Gijsels, Het leugenpaleis; Brewaeys and Deliège, thelatter being highly recommended. The official report of the investigation into theBrabant killings is published as Les Tueries du Brabant, various authors.(385) The report is published in full in Gijsels, L'Enquête. Amongst other things, theSûreté report stated: "The registered office of CEPIC is located at 39, rue Belliard inBrussels. The building also houses the Belliard auditorium, the registered office ofthe Mouvement d'Action pour l'Unité Européenne* and the offices of the Société dePromotion et de Distribution Générales (PDG) controlled by Benoît de Bonvoisinthrough front-men. *This is an otherwise unknown organization run by Benoît deBonvoisin bringing together various distinguished persons". MAUE was not sounknown to some at the Sûreté: one year previous to this report, as a MAUE bulletindated May, 1980 indicates, the President of MAUE, under whom de Bonvoisin servedas Board member, was Robert Nieuwenhuys, a former Sûreté Division Chief from1943 to 1945, attaché to Kings Léopold III and Baudouin until the end of the 1950sbefore becoming Head of Protocol for NATO Secretary-General Joseph Luns andserving with the Belgian Atlantic Association and the CEPIC Study Centre.Damman's diaries show that Nieuwenhuys had been in contact with theAESP/MAUE since at least 1977.(386) Latinus would later officially apply to become a regular officer within theSûreté. Massart would give his version of the Latinus affair in Les dés étaient pipés(The dice were loaded), Editions Quorum, Ottignies, 1997.(387) See Bouffioux; Brewaeys and Deliège.(388) It is not difficult to understand why the Brabant Wallon investigations neverexposed the truth when one learns that Didier Mievis was a member of one of theGendarmerie investigation teams from the very beginning.(389) Vivario, honorary aide de camp to the King, was an associate of Damman's,attending the March 1973 Wilton Park meeting as a member of the AESP delegationwith Damman and Jonet. Vivario's alleged involvement in coup plots is perhaps notsurprising, bearing in mind his rôle in creating the DSD, forerunner of Bougerol'sPIO, in 1970. Vivario died in November 1990 - see above; Brewaeys and Deliège, pg56; CelsiuS no. 36, January 1991.(390) Libertés, 14/2/91.(391) See Cornwell; Yallop, pgs 454-456. On Bagnasco, also see CelsiuS no. 42,July/August 1991. Despite the sniffer plane scandal, in June 1989 de Weck wouldbe appointed to the five-man Supervisory Board of the IOR, charged with selecting asuccessor to former IOR President, Archbishop Paul Marcinkus.(392) Gonsalez-Mata, pgs 52-53; Crozier, pgs 239-241.(393) Crozier, pgs 239-243.(394) On MI5's surveillance of CND, see Guardian, 21, 22 and 28/2/85; Reeve andSmith; Hollingsworth and Taylor, pgs 131-133; Campbell and Connor, pgs 282-284;Norton-Taylor, pgs 80, 83-84.(395) The Price of Peace, pg 1; Crozier, pg 246.(396) A letter reprinted in the Guardian (3/10/80) from John Adler at the SouthAfrican Embassy to Stewart-Smith states that funding from Pretoria was to be cutfrom the 1980 figure of R175,000 ($96,000) to R125,000 ($68,000) for 1981. On thisperiod of FARI, see State Research no 7; New Statesman, 15/2/80; Guardian, 7/6/78and 6/5/80; Lobster 11 (Ramsay and Dorril), pg 40; Herman and O'Sullivan, pg 269,note 62; Coxsedge, Coldicutt and Harant, pg 124.(397) On the CPD, see "Peddlers of crisis - the CPD and the Politics of Containment",Jerry W. Sanders, Pluto (UK)/South End Press (USA), 1983, and State Research no.16 (February-March 1980).(398) On CIA funding for Crozier's anti-CND camapigns, see Crozier, pg 245. Onthe Heritage Foundation's UK groups, see Guardian, 30/4/83, 8/10/83, 26/11/85,26/6/87 and New Statesman, 29/5/87. On IEDSS, see City Limits, 14/8/86; Lobster13, pg 18; Herman and O'Sullivan, pgs 80-81; IEDSS 1991 Publications List. Alsosee footnote 352 above.(399) Crozier, pgs 184-185.(400) Herman and O'Sullivan, pg 81.(401) Crozier, pg 189.(402) On IEDSS disinformation on the "spetsnaz threat", see this author and RobinRamsay’s piece Truth Twisting: notes on disinformation in Lobster 19 (May 1990) pgs20-22.(403) Crozier, pgs 243-246.(404) On Tennant's involvement in the creation of the MMU, see Daily Telegraph,20/11/86, from Joel van der Reijden; on the MMU, see Crozier, pg 279. On theCrozier/Lewis group, the Campaign against Council Corruption (CAMACC), seeCrozier, pgs 255-257. Julian Lewis studied at grammar school in Wales beforegraduating from Oxford in Philosophy and Politics; he received a DPhil in StrategicStudies from St Antony's College, Oxford in 1981. From 1981 to 1985, he wasResearch Director of the Coalition for Peace through Security; he then becameDirector of Policy Research Associates which, according to his website,"successfully campaigned for changes in the law on Educational Indoctrination,Media Bias, Propaganda on the Rates [local taxes], and Trade Union Democracy".From 1990 to 1996, Lewis was a Deputy Director of the Research Department atConservative Central Office (CCO) and Director of the CCO's MMU. In May 1997,he was elected to Parliament and still serves as MP today; since November 2002,he has been Shadow Junior Defence Minister specialising in the Royal Navy, RoyalMarines, nuclear deterrent and other strategic issues. Lewis’s colleague since 2002as Shadow Junior Defence Minister with responsibility for defence procurementand the Royal Air Force is another old Crozier friend – SIF’s Gerald Howarth whowas elected as MP for Aldershot, a major Army base, in May 1997. A third Crozierally within the Conservative Party is Edward Leigh, since 1997 "an enthusiasticallyThatcherite MP" (Crozier, pg 243) who has held the powerful post of Chairman ofthe Select Committee on Public Accounts since 2001. Having served as Thatcher’sprivate correspondence secretary from 1976-77 when she was Leader of theOpposition (briefed by Shield), Leigh worked closely with Lewis from 1981 to early1985 within the 6I’s Coalition for Peace through Security, of which Leigh wasGeneral Director and Lewis Research Director. "In Parliament, CAMACC’s mainactivist was Edward Leigh, who had earlier played a leading rôle in our Coalitionfor Peace through Security" – Crozier, pgs 256-257. To return to Lewis, he hastwice won the Trench Gascoigne prize awarded by the Royal United ServicesInstitute for Defence and Security Studies for his essays Nuclear Disarmamentversus Peace in the 21st Century (2005) and Double-I, Double-N: A Framework forCounter-Insurgency (2007) - see www.julianlewis.net/index.php. Described by theDaily Telegraph as "one of the most vigorous rightwingers in the Commons" and bythe Guardian as the Conservative Party's "front bench terrier", the man whoCrozier called "the 6I's leading activist in Britain" is a man certainly worth watching.His involvement in Lamont's Cercle, if any, is unknown. A typical quote from apress interview on his site: "I am not surprised that the Stasi were worried aboutthose of us who were working for the vital deployment of NATO Cruise missiles inBritain in 1983, and for the retention of our own nuclear deterrent. However, I amincreasingly alarmed at the determination of the Labour government to take noaction whatever to expose the identity of these despicable hacks and traitors whowere spying for our potential enemies at a crucial turning-point of the Cold War.Three-quarters of Labour MPs at that time were committed to one-sided nucleardisarmament, and several were fellow-travellers of the Soviet system, so it is notsurprising that the Government wishes to hush the matter up. What is moreworrying is that MI5 – our domestic security service – is colluding in this or was soincompetent that it failed to discover what was going on in the first place" –Lymington Times, 23/09/2000. He has mostly recently cropped up in the news ascoordinator of a ultimately successful campaign by MPs to prevent disclosure oftheir second-home addresses by amending the Freedom of Information Act - "DrLewis admitted that it would already be possible for someone to "target" aparticular MP. However, he warned of a situation where "someone with a grudge"or a follower of al-Qa'eda "conveniently finds 646 addresses and sends 646packages containing something explosive, horrible or, at the very least, abusive to646 unprotected mail boxes"." – Sunday Telegraph, 5/7/08.(405) New Statesman, 29/5/87.(406) Guardian, 26/6/87.(407) Crozier, pg 245.(408) Guardian, 26/6/87. Brenchley was a former ambassador to Norway andPoland, and former head of the Defence and Overseas Secretariat in the CabinetOffice from 1975 to 1978; after serving as Chairman of the ISC Council, he wouldlater chair the ISC successor, Paul Wilkinson's RISCT. A full biography of Brenchleyis given in Lobster 11.(409) Guardian, 26/6/87.(410) The "Gardiner case": a certain Mr Wood had infiltrated the Dutch peacecampers under the name of Gardiner, acting on orders from the BVD; it was laterconfirmed that the man named by Wood as his case officer was indeed a member ofthe BVD. According to Wood, the operation was coordinated by an American ColonelStevenson, based in Frankfurt, and Mr. Blackburn, a US Embassy official in theHague. Wood alleged his mission was to use "all means" to encourage violent actionsby the Dutch peace-campers; to this end, he promoted and participated in the theftof the ammunition with Belgian peace campaigners - see Le Soir, 4/9/91.(411) Crozier, pgs 245-246. The Bonner Friedensforum (Bonn Peace Forum) was ananti-disarmament propaganda group active during the upswing in the peacemovement in the early eighties; Crozier recalls that it was "largely composed ofstudents alerted to the dangers of unconditional pacifism. Our funds contributed tothe cost of posters and banners displayed during demonstrations" – see Crozier, pg246; footnote 436 below. The Belgian Rally had been created by "our man inBrussels", probably Jacques Jonet, the former political secretary to Habsburg whohad assumed much of the mantle of the late Florimond Damman. Crozier's mentionof "a well-known general" (pg 246) almost certainly refers to Close.(412) Close, who died in 2003, had one interesting early posting as BelgianMilitary Attaché in London from 1967 to 1970. On the EIS, see Die ContraConnection, pgs 282-284, Roth and Ender, pgs 80-81; Van Bosbeke, pgs 17-18. OnMBB, see Gonsalez-Mata, pgs 58, 158. Details of the creation of the EIS and itsproper title are sketchy; the three sources on the EIS give slightly inconsistentinformation. Roth and Ender, the earliest source, and Van Bosbeke both seem to beunaware of the 1981 Brussels conference, mentioned only in Die Contra Connection,which gives the fullest list of names. Van Bosbeke gives the EIS title in German,citing Roth and Ender. However, if the EIS was founded by Close and met inBrussels and Luxembourg before dissolving, one would expect the organisation'sname to be in French.(413) On IEPS, see Van Bosbeke, pgs 16-17.(414) On AESRI, see Die Contra Connection, pgs 272-274, and Roth and Ender, pg48. The US-based Western Goals Foundation would not long survive the death inSeptember 1983 of its founder, Democratic Congressman Larry McDonald, ironicallykilled on Korean Airlines flight KAL007, part of a Pentagon 'black' programme testingSoviet air defences that was shot down by Russia.(415) Roth and Ender, pg 61.(416) Another member of the Coalition for Peace through Strength was RichardPerle, appointed by Reagan as Deputy Defence Secretary, the fourth Reaganappointment of Cercle contacts to high positions, Casey, Allen and Stilwell beingthe other three – see Crozier, pg 243. On the Reagan Administration's links tomany right-wing defence strategy groups such as the CPS, CPD and CFW, see thebackground paper The Reagan Administration in State Research no.22, February-March 1981, pgs 78-90.(417) Herman and O'Sullivan, pg 99.(418) Hollingsworth and Norton-Taylor, pg 132 - an excellent book. For Elwell's MI5career, see Dorril; Leigh; Norton-Taylor, pgs 19, 85, 88 - one of the best books of itsday on the British security and intelligence services.(419) Guardian, 2/10/89, 14-15/12/89; Norton-Taylor, pg 19; Lobster 18, October1989, pg 34. On Clockwork Orange 2 and Colin Wallace, see Foot, and Lobster 11 -20.(420) Observer, 9/12/90 and 16/12/90. Also see the television programmes ThisWeek (26/4/90) and World in Action (10/12/90).(421) Contributions varying between £5,000 to £10,000 were made by Boots,Unilever, Bass, BP, the Hanson Trust, Courage, GKN, Allied Lyons, ICI and UnitedNewspapers, publishers of the Daily Express and Sunday Express. The Trust'ssecretary was John Arkell, a former Boots director; trustees included Lord McAlpineand Lord Boyd-Carpenter, former chairman of backbench Tory peers. Councilmembers included Sir Austin Bide of Glaxo, Peter Calazet of BP, and Sir DerekPalmar of Bass and United Newspapers.(422) On IRD, Common Cause and IRIS, see Dorril and Ramsay (1990).(423) See Lobster 19, pg 20, and Observer, 2/10/88.(424) Paul Foot, Daily Mirror, 14/12/90.(425) Herman and O'Sullivan, pg 107.(426) Herman and O'Sullivan, pg 105.(427) On Wilkinson and the RFST, see Lobster 16, pg 16 (list of Board Members),pgs 23-24 and insert; Lobster 17, pgs 17-18; Herman and O'Sullivan.(428) Observer, 7/12/86.(429) See The Terrorism Reader, Walter Laqueur and Ariel Merari, Meridian NALPenguin, New York, 1987 (Horchem's contribution was originally published inTerrorism - an international journal), and Contemporary Research on Terrorism, PaulWilkinson and Alasdair Stewart, Aberdeen University Press, Aberdeen 1987.(430) Gemballa, pg 130: the two books were Krieg im Frieden - Theorien desTerrorismus (War in Peacetime - Theories of Terrorism) and Die verlorene Revolution(The lost revolution). Horchem is also author of Extremisten in einer selbstbewusstenDemokratie (Extremists in a self-aware democracy), Herder, 1975 and ZumEntwicklungsstand des Rechtsextremismus im demokratischen Rechtsstaat (On thedevelopment of right-wing extremism in the democratic State of law), Funke, 1978.(431) On all of the above groups, see Herman and O'Sullivan. On Tugwell and theCCS, see Lobster 16, July 1988, pgs 22-23; Lobster 17, November 1988, pg 17; Manz- a major piece on South African propaganda in Canada; Herman and O'Sullivan,pgs 115-116, 173-176; Foot, pgs 16, 18, 22. On the Mackenzie Institute, see Crozierpg 204 and Lobster 16.(432) Spiegel, 51/1984, pgs 92-93 and Unheimliche Patrioten, pgs 609-611.(433) Crozier, pg 193.(434) Crozier, pgs 287-288.(435) Crozier, pg 290.(436) The Bonn Peace Forum was also mentioned in a letter from Crozier to Huyn,dated 9th January, 1989, which prepared for this Cercle Pinay meeting the nextmonth: "My dear Hans, I hope that the Bonn Peace Forum still exists, or, if not, thatsomething similar exists or can be built up. The idea is to use such an organizationto circulate particular slogans" - see footnote 438.(437) Having served as Deputy Director of the CIA from 1972 to 1976, Vernon"Dick" Walters was a founding member of Crozier's 6I in February 1977. In 1981,Walters was appointed roving US Ambassador by Reagan and would serve asAmbassador to the UN from 1985 to 1989. In April 1989, he was appointedAmbassador to West Germany, a post he would fill until August 1991, ushering inGerman reunification in October 1990. Walters died in 2002.(438) Translated from the German given in Roth, pgs 31-33. Roth's book was on thetheme of the "October Surprise", recycling much of Barbara Honegger's book andincluding a series of contacts with Dirk Stoffberg, South African hit squad leader.Roth claimed to have been given the 1989 Cercle minutes and Crozier's letter quotedabove by a British intelligence officer based in Bonn. The diaries of Minister of Statefor Defence Alan Clark, published in 1994, revealed that a later meeting of theCercle was held in Oman in November 1990. Attendees at the meeting at the AlBustan hotel, Muscat, included Lord Julian Amery (joint Cercle Chairman), SheikhQaboos (Ruler of Oman), Jonathan Aitken (Minister of Defence Procurement), PaulChannon (former secretary of State at the Dept. of Trade & Industry), GeneralNorman Schwarzkopf (Commander of the Allied forces in the Gulf), the unnamedHead of the Dutch Secret Service, and an unnamed French Admiral. Another Cercleguest around this time was former SOE and MI6 officer and later Conservative MPfor Inverness Lt-Col. 'Billy' McLean, named in the 1990 book, One Man in His Time:the Life of Lt-Col. N. L. D. 'Billy' McLean, DSO by Xan Fielding (Macmillan, London1990), pg. 205, which also mentioned that Cercle meetings were held in Bonn,Munich and Washington and first named Amery as Chairman of the Cercle - seeLobster 22, pg 17. McLean, Fielding, Amery and Roland Winn (Lord St Oswald)would serve together in SOE in Albania and/or Siam.(439) Crozier, pg 291.(440) The IED would hold its Second International Assizes on Disinformation in theFrench Assemblée Nationale on 10-11th April 1992. The choice of the FrenchAssemblée Nationale as venue for the IED's Second International Assizes onDisinformation reflected a move away from the internationalism of the First Assizestowards a more French-centred attendance. The participants at the two days ofpresentations on "Disinformation in the world" and "Disinformation in France" werealmost all from French academic or media circles with a scattering of senior securityofficials, notably former DST Director Jean Rochet who had attended the FirstAssizes, and former Renseignements Généraux Director, Roger Chaix. Theattendance at the First Assizes of many of the Cercle's international contacts hadbeen slimmed down by the Second Assizes to just Brian Crozier, "Sovietologist", whospoke on "The story behind the Moscow coup and the exact historic rôle of MikhailGorbachev". The only other foreign speakers were from the former Eastern bloc,notably the ex-Soviet dissident and vocal right-winger Vladimir Bukovsky, who hadalready worked in the Cercle's earlier anti-disarmament campaign, see Crozier, pg246.(441) Dumont "has, over the last twenty-four years [i.e. since 1967], gainedconsiderable experience of international affairs: first as Brussels-based EC andNATO correspondent, and more recently in his present capacity as a political anddiplomatic analyst in Paris. Mr. Dumont is a former Auditor [auditeur, free pupil] ofFrance's National Institute for Advanced Defence Studies (IHEDN, whose Directorfrom 1972 to 1974 was Cercle associate General Callet) and a graduate of theInstitute of Security Studies at Kiel University, Germany. He is also currentlyDirector of the Centre for Intelligence Studies (Europe). He has published andcontributed to a number of studies, among which: The Peace Movements in Europeand America (London, 1985); Für ein Deutschland in der Zukunft [For a Germany inthe Future] (Berlin, 1985); and La Désinformation Stratégique et les Mesures ActivesSoviétiques [Strategic Disinformation and Soviet Active Measures] (Paris, 1987)" –see Various authors (IFF), pg vii. The date of Dumont's last book seems to indicatethat the IED was founded some while before its first 1989 Assizes.(442) Horchem's book was published in 1989 by the Deutsches Strategie-Forum;the other two were Gorbachev's Operation: A Common European House - SovietStrategic Deception, Count Hans Huyn, Center for Intelligence Studies Reprint Series2, Alexandria VA, USA, September 1990, and The Gorbachev Phenomenon: Peace andSecret War, Brian Crozier, Claridge Press, London 1990, on which see Crozier, pgs290-291. Canon Michael Bourdeaux, director of Keston Research, Oxford, would alsoweigh in with Gorbachev, Glasnost and The Gospel, Hodder and Stoughton, 1990.Bourdeaux had been refused a visa by the Soviet authorities in October 1989 – seeGuardian, 11/10/89.(443) Front for Apartheid in Newsday, 16/07/95. The article was reported by DeleOlojede in South Africa and Timothy M. Phelps in Washington, and written byOlojede – see the IFF annex below for the text and further details.(444) Interestingly, the IFF's creation in 1986 coincided with the closure after tenyears of the London-based FARI, previous beneficiary of DoI/DMI funds. The IFF'smajor publication was the book Glasnost, New Thinking and the ANC-SACP Alliance:A Parting of Ways, a title which sums up the IFF's propaganda line; its regularpublications included the journals laissez-faire and terra nova, OPPORTUNITIESBriefing (Eastern and Central Europe) and Perspectives (former Soviet Union). TheIFF would also follow a hard anti-EU line with the research papers Sir Leon's InvisibleHand – Competition Enforcement in the EC and Culture Vultures – the EC's Impositionof Cultural Conformity. One author for the IFF's magazine terra nova would beBilderberger Sir Frederic Bennett, from 1970 an associate of G. K. Young's inKleinwort Benson, SIF and Unison, and from 1975 a companion of Crozier's in NAFFand FARI.(445) No other activities of the IFF's German branch are known. The IFF would alsospawn a British offshoot, IFF (UK), largely independent of its American parent and oflittle direct relevance to the Cercle or 6I – on which see Lobster 16, July 1988, pgs18-19. The IFF UK's address was at Suite 500, Chesham House, 150 Regent's Street... perhaps coincidence, but for British parapolitical researchers, reminiscent of 'Box500', a longstanding government cover-name for MI5.(446) According to German Wikipedia, Huyn withdrew from public life after thedeath of his wife in 2004.(447) Earlier in 1991, Horchem had helped to prop up the allied war effort duringthe first Iraq War by resurrecting the "threat" of international terrorism; during aninterview for the British Channel 4 television programme Dispatches on 30thJanuary 1991, he warned that over one thousand Iraqi hitmen lurked in everycorner of Europe. His Bonn Institute for Terrorism Research would close in 1993, theyear he published his memoirs, Auch Spione werden pensioniert (Even spies retire),E.S. Mittler & Sohn, Herford, Berlin and Bonn. Rolf Tophoven, Horchem's deputy inthe Bonn institute, would go on to found the Essen-based Institut fürTerrorismusforschung und Sicherheitspolitik (Institute for Terrorism Research andSecurity Policy, IFTUS) in 2003 and is a notable terrorism commentator in Germanytoday.(448) In the late 1990s, Dumont would write for the Hanns-Seidel-Stiftung,contributing to the HSS bi-monthly Politische Studien (Political Studies) no 351 ofJanuary-February 1997, a special issue devoted to "New Threats to State Security";Dumont's article on the evolution of terrorism quoted abundantly from Horchem.NSIC ANNEX1989 text taken from: http://rightweb.irc-online.org/gw/2806.html.GroupWatch: Profiles of U.S. Private Organizations and Churches, wascompiled by the Interhemispheric Resource Center, Box 2178, Silver City,NM 88062. Check when each article was last updated as much material is nolonger current. This material is provided as a source for historicresearch.National Strategy Information CenterAcronym/Code: NSICUpdated: 8/89Categories:PoliticalBackground:The NSIC is a right-wing think tank for military strategy. It has ahistory of working with hard-line, anti-Soviet groups promoting anaggressive U.S. foreign policy. (10)In a 1961 article in the Military Review on the subject of politicalwarfare, Frank Barnett wrote,"Political warfare in short, is warfare--notpublic relations. It is one part persuasion and two parts deception. Itembraces diverse forms of coercion and violence including strikes andriots, economic sanctions, subsidies for guerrilla or proxy warfare and,when necessary, kidnapping or assassination of enemy elites."The aim of political warfare... is to discredit, displace, and neutralizean opponent, to destroy a competing ideology, and to reduce the adherentsto political impotence. It is to make one's own values prevail by workingthe levers of power, as well as by using persuasion."(22)In 1962, Frank Barnett founded NSIC. Among its founding directors,officers and advisers were such stalwart right-wing figures as beer baronand funder of many ultra-rightist organizations Joseph Coors; PrescottBush, Jr. , brother of President George Bush; Frank Shakespeare, chairmanof the conservative think tank, the Heritage Fdn; and William Casey,former director of the CIA. (1,11,29)The stated purpose of NSIC is to "encourage a civilmilitary partnership"to keep the public informed on issues surrrounding national defense. Aproperly informed public, the NSIC believes, will support "A viable U.S.defense system capable of protecting the nation's vital interests andassisting allies and other free nations determined to maintain their corevalues of freedom and independence."(12) One of the goals of NSIC is "totrain young American labor leaders in the critical issues--philosophy,military, and political--that divide the free world from the CommunistStates."(10) The group focuses its efforts on business, labor,professional and military groups; academic and mass media; governmentalschools; and colleges and universities. (12)Funding:Between 1973 and 1981, Richard Scaife donated a total of $6 million to theNSIC from the Carthage Fdn, the Sarah Scaife Fdn, and the Trust for theGrandchildren of Sarah Mellon Scaife. (1) In 1985 the John M. Olin Fdngave the Washington office of NSIC three grants: $107,320 for support foran advisory committee for European democracy; $41,300 for support for abook by Abram Shulsky on American intelligence and national security; and$20,000 to support educational programs on the nature of totalitarianregimes. (3) In the same year, the NY office received the followinggrants: $10,000 from the Adolph Coors Fdn for programs and publications onnational security; $35,000 for work on the history of Soviet intelligence,$30,000 for research and writing on detente, and $15,000 support for aconference at the Center for European Strategy from the Winston Salem Fdn;$5,000 of general support from the Samuel Roberts Nobel Fdn; and from theW. W. Smith Charitable Trust $260,000 for operating support and $70,000for a Consortium for the Study of Intelligence which examines theintelligence networks of various nations. (3)In 1986, the Washington office of NSIC received $41,000 from the John M.Olin Fdn to support the book by Abram Shulsky on American intelligence andnational security, and $152,000 from the Lynde and Harry Bradley Fdn tosupport a program on national defense and intelligence. (4) In 1986, theN. Y. office received $15,000 from the Smith Richardson Fdn, $5,000 fromthe TRW Fdn, and $175,000 from the Sarah Scaife Fdn for general operatingsupport. (4)In 1981-1982, the NSIC received a grant from the U.S. Information Agencyto study the feasibility of an Intl Youth Year conference. (2)The organization lists its 1989 budget as $1,600,000. (12)Activities:The NSIC worked with the Committee on the Present Danger (CPD) as alobbyist for the preservation of containment militarism, a policydemanding a strong U.S. military build-up and presence throughout theworld. The CPD saw the Soviet Union as a powerful evil force with the goalof world domination. (10) In order to be more effective in its work withthe CPD, NSIC opened a full-scale office in Washington DC in 1976 tointeract with the White House and the Pentagon, to work with TradeAssociations, and to inform the public of the concepts and plans of theCPD. (10) In setting up the DC office, Barnett worked directly withultra-hawk Eugene V. Rostow of the CPD. Barnett brought Rostow onto theNSIC board. (10)The NSIC Washington office, run by Roy Godson, has spent the decade of the1980s developing a nine volume agenda for U.S. foreign policy, with aspecial focus on low intensity warfare and intelligence. (28,29) Accordingto NSIC's literature the purpose of NSIC's Consortium for the Study ofIntelligence (CSI) is to encourage colleges and universities to offerin-depth programs of study on intelligence; to promote the development ofa U.S. theory of intelligence and define its place in American nationalsecurity policy; to encourage research into the intelligence process; andto study the tensions between intelligence activities and the democraticprocess and values of our society. (31)Subjects of the volumes include: The Elements of Intelligence; Analysisand Estimates; Counterintelligence; Covert Action; Clandestine Collection;Domestic Intelligence; and Intelligence and Policy. (31)The production of each volume of the series was preceeded by a conferenceor symposium of invited guests where the substance of the volume wasdeveloped. Attendees at the conferences became defacto important playersin the activities of the think tank. The CIA, the military intelligencedivisions, and the executive branches of government were well representedat all of the gatherings. (28,30,31) The second volume in the series,Intelligence Requirements for the 1980's: Analysis and Estimates, waspublished in 1980. It attempts to teach people how to evaluate the qualityof and analyze intelligence information received from agents. (30) Amongthose present at the 1979 colloquium that developed the substance of thisvolume were such intelligence luminaries as Richard V. Allen of the NatlSecurity Council; William Colby, former head of the CIA; Dr. Ray S. Cline,former deputy director of the CIA; Dr. Fred C. Ikle, former director ofthe Arms Control and Disarmament Agency; Mr. Morris Liebman, chairman ofthe American Bar Association; and from the NSIC, Dr. Roy Godson and FrankR. Barnett. (30)The subject of the 1981 conference was clandestine collection which led tothe 1982 volume on the subject. This document claims that U.S.intelligence gathering is far inferior to that of the Soviet Union andsets out the U.S. intelligence needs. (31) Notable figures attending thiscolloquium included: Dr. Ray Cline of the Center for Strategic and IntlStudies; Lt. Gen. Daniel Graham, former director of the DefenseIntelligence Agency; Dr. Edward Luttwak, ultra-hawk and expert onterrorism; and Dr. Richard Pipes, former chief Sovietologist at the NatlSecurity Council. (10,31)In 1983, the NSIC, the Natl Defense University, and the Natl SecurityStudies Program of Georgetown co-sponsored a symposium on "The Role ofSpecial Operations in U.S. Strategy for the 1980s."(21) Col. Oliver North,of Iran-Contra fame, attended as a representative of the National SecurityCouncil. (21) Edward N. Luttwak and Arnaud de Borchgrave, editor of theUnification Church-owned Washington Times, were present representing theCenter for Strategic and Intl Studies. (21) Margo D. B. Carlisle, staffdirector of the U.S. Senate Republican Conference Committee, was alsopresent. Carlisle, a former aide to Sen. James McClure, attended the 1980World AntiCommunist League (WACL) conference and has been connected withWACL activities in Central America. (8) The CIA was represented by anumber of people, including former assoc deputy director TheodoreShackley. The intelligence agencies of the military-especially the DefenseIntelligence Agency, formerly headed by Gen. Daniel Graham--attended innumber. (10,21)In its 1984 book, Special Operations in U.S. Strategy, the NSIC showed ashift in strategy from containment militarism to one promoting lowintensity conflict operations. The new strategy stresses the need forfulfilling U.S. objectives through "special operations." According to thestrategy, the "special operations" are to be coordinated with the privatesector in the countries where these operations are located, and call forthe use of psychological techniques and operations. (11)The NSIC strategies, according to an analysis by the Political ResearchAssociates of Boston, advocate a U.S. policy of low-intensity conflict."Inpractice it is an endless, ongoing, permanent form of paramilitary actionagainst governments and political movements that assert independence fromU.S. domination."(29) Other criticisms of these volumes have ranged fromcalling them "authoritarian" to "a political blueprint for a policestate."(29)On Godson's recommendation, the NSIC paid Arturo Cruz, Sr. of thedirectorate of the Nicaraguan contras $40,000 to serve as a researchfellow for six months. (2)Roy Godson was a key figure in Anglo-American trade union relations,organizing "educational visits" for British trade unionists to visit theU.S. during the Reagan administration. (14) The trips were organized underthe auspices of the Labour Desk of the U.S. Youth Council and the IntlLabor Program of Georgetown University. The purpose of the trips was "tobroaden international education about Western democratic values." Atypical trip included a visit to the naval base at Norfolk, a meeting withformer ambassador to the United Nations (Reagan administration) JeaneKirkpatrick, talks on defense at the National Security Council (formeroperational base of Col. Oliver North) and talks at the NSIC. The tripswere financed by the Reagan administration. (14)Government Connections:Frank Shakespeare was a United States Information Agency director and adirector of Radio Free Europe and Radio Liberty. (15) During the Reaganadministration he served as ambassador to Portugal from 1985 to 1987, andafter that as ambassador to the Vatican. (15)William Casey was CIA director in the Reagan administration, served aschair of the Securities and Exchange Commission from 1971 to 1973, and asUnder Secretary of State for Economic Affairs from February 1973 to March1974. (1,23)Roy Godson served as a consultant to the President's Foreign IntelligenceAdvisory Board--a group of private citizens that oversees intelligenceoperations--in the Reagan administration. (2) Eugene V. Rostow was one ofthe architects of the containment militarism policy of the Reaganadministration. He served as President Reagan's head of the Arms Controland Disarmament Agency. (10)Richard Pipes served as a National Security adviser to President RonaldReagan and was a major figure in the Committee on the Present Danger. (1)Hon. Antonin Scalia, justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, is listed as amember of the Consortium for the Study of Intelligence. (13)Margo D. B. Carlisle was an aide to Sen. James McClure (RID). (8) MargoCarlisle attended the 1980 WACL conference and is was involved in the"repackaging" of Roberto D'Aubuisson, the founder and former head of theARENA party in El Salvador. (8)Admiral Thomas Moorer was head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and a memberof Team B, a group assembled in the mid 1970s by then-CIA director GeorgeBush to study the Soviet danger. The Team B laid the foundation for therevitalization of the Committee on the Present Danger. (1,10)Private Connections:Frank Barnett was a prominent member of the Committee on the PresentDanger, an anti-Soviet group advocating a strong U.S. military and apolicy of containment militarism. (10) Before founding NSIC, Barnett wasthe director of research for the ultra-right Smith-Richardson Fdn and aprogram director of the Institute for American Strategy. (22)William Casey served as pres and chairman of the exec committee of theInternational Rescue Committee (IRC), a private voluntary organizationthat helps refugees from totalitarian oppression. (24) The IRC worked withthe CIA in Vietnam and cooperates with the U.S. government on programs inEl Salvador. (25)Prescott Bush, Jr. , a former director of the NSIC, is brother toPresident George Bush. He is a member of the Knights of Malta, aconservative lay Catholic group and has been involved with Americares, aright-wing private organization that receives grants from the U.S. Agencyfor International Development in Central America. (15)Henry Fowler, former NSIC director, was co-chair of the Committee on thePresent Danger until 1988. Fowler was Secretary of the Treasury underPresident Harry Truman. (1)Admiral Thomas Moorer, former NSIC director, served on the nationaladvisory board of Accuracy in Media, a right-wing media group thatpromotes conservative causes and monitors the teaching of collegeprofessors. (6,7) Moorer has been on the board of the American SecurityCouncil, an ultra-hawk organization that works on Congress to effect ananti-Soviet foreign policy. ASC runs the powerful lobby, the Coalition forPeace Through Strength, which has more than 190 Congressional members.(9,33) He also served on the board of Western Goals, a group that focusedon national security and gathered information on suspected communistsymphthizers. (8)Frank Shakespeare, former director of NSIC, is chairman of The HeritageFdn, a conservative think tank that played an important role in policydevelopment in the Reagan administration. (10) He is also a member of theKnights of Malta and the American Catholic Committee (ACC). The ACC is agroup that tried to undercut the U.S. bishops' pastoral on the economy.(15)"Joseph Coors," wrote Al Weinrub in the Labor Report on CentralAmerica,"has used the power of the Coors financial dynasty not only toprovide support to the contras, but to set a right-wing political agendain the U.S..."(16) Coors was the chair of the Rocky Mountain regionReagan/Bush campaign in 1984. (17) He provided financial backing forAccuracy in Media, a media support group for the right wing. (17) He alsosupported various groups organized by New Right tactician Paul Weyrichincluding the Catholic Center, a religious group that sent conservative"truth squads" to organize workshops in cities with liberal bishops, andthe Free Congress Fdn, a group dedicated to electing conservatives toCongress. (18,19) Coors and Weyrich combined efforts again in founding theconservative think tank, the Heritage Fdn. (19) Coors money has alsosupported right-wing religious groups including the Church League ofAmerica, Fellowship of Christian Athletes, the Moral Majority, and CampusCrusade for Christ. (19) Coors supported Lt. Gen. John Singlaub's U.S.Council for World Freedom (USCWF), the U.S. chapter of the WorldAnti-Communist League. USCWF and the Nicaraguan Refugee Fund, (anotherCoor's cause) played major roles in funding the Nicaraguan contras. (19)Both Joseph Coors and his wife Holly were on the 1982-1983 board of theCouncil for Natl Policy. (20)Roy Godson is the Director of the International Labor program atGeorgetown University and was deeply involved in the Iran-Contra Affair.He was a contact person and middle-man in fundraising for Lt. Col. OliverNorth's network to supply the contras. He connected Terry Slease, attorneyfor Richard Scaife (wealthy right-wing philanthropist and NSIC donor),with North, and was present at meetings between National SecurityAdviserBud McFarland, North and Slease. (2) Godson was a representative ofthe Intl Youth Conference which was one of the organizations used tochannel funds to the Nicaraguan contras. He also was indirectly connected,through Slease, with the Institute for North-South Issues, a group fundedby the National Endowment for Democracy, that served as a channel forcontra funds. Godson also served as a contact between the private contranetwork and Edward Feulner, president of Heritage Fdn. Heritage served asa pass-through for INSI of a $100,000 donation to the Nicaraguanopposition. (2) Godson serves on the board of the League for IndustrialDemocracy, a neoconservative organization working with labor groups in theU.S. (26) He is also on the board of the Coalition for a DemocraticMajority, a quasi-governmental group that works primarily within the ranksof Congress to implement an anticommunist, pro-military agenda. (10,27)Ray Cline served on the board of NSIC's Consortium for the Study ofIntelligence. Cline is a former deputy director of the CIA, and has beeninvolved with Major General John Singlaub's U.S. Council for WorldFreedom, the U.S. branch of the World Anti-Communist League. (8)Lt. Gen. Daniel Graham is on the board of the U.S. Council for WorldFreedom. He is founder and chairman of the pro-SDI lobby group, HighFrontier, and was on the 1982-1983 board of the Council for Natl Policy.Graham has also been involved with CAUSA, the political arm of theUnification Church (UC) and the American Freedom Coalition, anotherChristian political offshoot of the UC. (8,20,32)Richard Pipes was a member of the Coalition for a Democratic Majority anda founding member of the Committee on the Present Danger. (10)Misc:Political Research Associates of Boston note that lowintensity warfare asdefined by the NSIC is low intensity only from a U.S. governmentperspective where high-intensity warfare means nuclear war. (29)Comments:U.S. Address: 150 East 58th St, New York, NY 10155 and 1730 Rhode IslandAve, NW, Suite 601, Washington DC, 20036.Principals:Frank R. Barnett and Morris Liebman, co-founders. (2) Frank R. Barnett,president; Roy Godson, director of the Washington DC office. (5) Otherslisted as officers in 1984 were: Dorothy Nicolosi, vice pres andtreasurer, Paul E. Feffer, intl vice pres, Rear Admiral William C. Mott(ret. ), vice pres and general counsel, Hugh F. McGowan, Jr. , sec, andOmer Pace, asst sec and asst tres. (11)Directors listed in 1984 were: Karl R. Bendetsen, former chairman and CEOof Champion Intl Corp; D. Tennant Bryan, chairman of the board of MediaGeneral, Inc; Prescott S. Bush, Jr, senior vice pres and director ofJohnson & Higgins; Richard C. Ham; Morris I. Liebman, Sidley & Austin;John Norton Moore; Admiral Thomas H. Moorer (ret. ); Jerald C. Newman,pres and CEO of The Bowery Savings Bank; Robert H. Parsley, Butler,Binion, Rice, Cook and Knapp; Frank Shakespeare, vice chairman of RKOGeneral, Inc; Charles E. Stevenson, pres Denver West; James L. Winokur,chairman of Air Tool Parts and Service Co; Major General Richard A. Yudkin(ret. ), senior vice pres (ret. ) of Owens-Corning Fiberglas Corp. (11)The 1984 Advisory Council members were: Issac L. Auerbach, Vice Admiral M.G. Bayne (ret. ), Allyn R. Bell, Jr, Joseph Coors, Henry H. Fowler, JohnW. Hanes, Jr, Admiral Means Johnston (ret. ), R. Daniel McMichael, RearAdmiral David L. Martineau (ret. ), Chuck Mau, Vice Admiral J. P. Moorer(ret. ), Dillard Munford, Lloyd Noble, Harry A. Poth, Jr, Adolph W.Schmidt, Frederick Seitz, Laurence H. Silberman, Arthur Spitzer, John A.Sutro, Albert L. Weeks, Dee Workman, Evelle J. Younger, Admiral Elmo R.Zumwalt, Jr (ret. ). (11)The conferences and symposiums sponsored by NSIC play an important part inthe development of the organization's strategy recommendations andpublications. Personnel from NSIC who attended the 1983 symposium,"TheRole of Special Operations in U.S. Strategy for the 1980s," were: FrankBarnett, president; Sara A. Begley, research asst for the Council onEconomics and Natl Security; Dr. Roy Godson, director of the DC office;Robert A. Silano, exec dir of the Council on Economics and Natl Security;and B. Hugh Tovar, research assoc.Sources:1. John Saloma III, Ominous Politics (New York, NY: Farrar, Straus andGiroux, 1984).2. Report of the Congressional Committees Investigating the Iran-ContraAffair, Appendix B, Vol. 12, 1987.3. Foundation Grants Index, Recipients, 1987. 4. Foundation Grants Index,Recipients, 1988.5. Phone conversation with Mr. Lovelace of NSIC, Washington DC, Aug 10,1989.6. Saul Landau,"Dress Rehersal For a Red Scare," The Nation, Apr 5, 1986.7. Accuracy In Media brochure, undated.8. Scott Anderson and Jon Lee Anderson, Inside the League: The ShockingExpose of How Terrorists, Nazis, and Latin American Death Squads HaveInfiltrated the World Anti-Communist League (New York, NY: Dodd, Mead &Co, 1986).9. Peace Through Strength, American Security Council report, undated,received Dec 15, 1988.10. Jerry Sanders, Peddlers of Crisis: The Committee on the Present Dangerand the Politics of Containment Militarism (Boston, MA: South End Press,1983).11. Special Operations in U.S. Strategy, NSIC, 1984.12. The Encyclopedia of Associations, 23rd edition, 1989.13. Letterhead from the Consortium for the Study of Intelligence, undated.14."Anglo-American Union Exchanges Linked to Irangate Scandal," Tribune,Sep 30, 1988.15. Penny Lernoux,"Who's Who? The Knights of Malta Know," NationalCatholic Reporter, May 5, 1989.16. Al Weinrub,"Coors Brews More Than Beer," Labor Report On CentralAmerica, Sep/Oct 1985.17. Michael Massing,"The Rise and Decline of Accuracy," The Nation, Sep13, 1986.18. Penny Lernoux,"A Reverence for Fundamentalism," The Nation, Apr 17,1989.19. The New Right Humanitarians (Albuquerque, NM: The Resource Center,1986).20. List of the board of directors of The Council for National Policy,1982-1983.21. Participant list from the "Symposium on the Role of Special Operationsin U.S. Strategy for the 1980s," March 4-5, 1983.22. Frank R. Barnett,"A Proposal for Political Warfare," Military Review,Mar 1961.23. Profile of William J. Casey, completed in Oct 1974. Received fromPolitical Research Associates, Aug 1989.24. Intl Rescue Commisstion Annual Report, 1986.25. AIFLD: Agents as Organizers (Albuquerque, NM: The Resource Center,1987).26. Letter from the League for Industrial Democracy, July 1989.27. Coalition for a Democratic Majority letterhead, July 1989.28. Conversation with Chip Berlet of Political Research Associates, Aug1989.29."The Coors Extended Family," Political Research Associates, 1989.30. Roy Godson, editor, excerpts from Intelligence Requirements for the1980's: Analysis and Estimates, NSIC, 1980.31. Roy Godson, editor, excerpts from Intelligence Requirements for the1980's: Clandestine Collection, NSIC, 1982.32. Phone conversation with the natl office of the American FreedomCoalition, Sep 9, 1988.33. Peace Through Strength, American Security Council report, undated,received Dec 15, 1988.The underlying cites for this profile are now kept at Political ResearchAssociates, (617) 666-5300. www.publiceye.org. END OF WEB ARTICLEIFF ANNEXTaken from http://www.geocities.com/CapitolHill/2807/lhiff.html?200610:Editors Note:Front for Apartheid, appeared in Newsday, Sunday, July 16, 1995. The article wasreported by Dele Olojede in South Africa and Timothy M. Phelps in Washington. The articleconcerns a Washington think-tank called the International Freedom Foundation that had branches inJohannesburg, South Africa and London, England. The International Freedom Foundation wasactually a front for intelligence operators who worked on psycho-political operations to prolongapartheid. People involved included United States Department of State Officials, United StatesCongressmen, and US Intelligence agents. The article says "jobs" for South African intelligenceprovided at least half of the total IFF revenue, and South African military intelligence would sendfees from the "jobs" directly to the IFF Washington office.The article is a limited hangout that doesn't mention the South African Institute of InternationalAffairs, The Royal Institute of International Affairs, or the Council on Foreign Relations. The articlehas a picture of Secretary of State George Shultz shaking hands with Oliver Tambo, the late exiledleader of ANC, at the State Department in 1987. The article mentions that people like HenryKissinger were invited to International Freedom Foundation seminars to deliver keynote speeches.Among those in attendance was former CIA director William Colby. Shultz, Kissinger and Colbywere members of the Council on Foreign Relations. The article talks about Americans who were onthe board of Directors of the IFF, and who worked for the IFF in South Africa. Nearly every manmentioned was a United States Intelligence agent at one time or another. Do former United Statesintelligence agents, continuing working as agents even after they become elected governmentofficials, or are appointed to the US Department of State?A list of some of the people mentioned in the story with locations and dates of intelligence servicefollows:SHULTZ GEORGE P (Council on Foreign Relations Member) Panama 1984, Grenada 1984, Libya1986KISSINGER, HENRY A (Council on Foreign Relations member ) South Africa 1969-1977,Philippines 1972, Indonesia 1975, Angola 1976, Britain 1976, Chile 1976,China 1989-1997COLBY WILLIAM EGAN (Council on Foreign Relations member) Norway 1944-1952, Sweden1951-1953, Italy 1953-1958, Vietnam 1959-1971, Indonesia 1963-1965, Chile 1970-1973, Japan1985, Singapore 1985DORNAN ROBERT K (R-CA) Laos 1981SELLARS, DUNCAN W (Chairman IFF, 1993) South Africa 1986, Nicaragua 1988ABRAMOFF JACK South Africa 1983KEYES ALAN L India 1979-1980, Zimbabwe 1980-1981BURTON DAN L (R-IN) Mozambique 1986HELMS JESSE A (R-NC) Argentina 1975-1976, Taiwan 1975, Chile 1976-1986, Panama 1977,Guatemala 1981, Mozambique 1986 ,South Africa 1986WILLIAMSON CRAIG South Africa 1980-1998DE KLERK F W South Africa 1986-1996BOOYSE WIM South Africa 1993YUILL MARTIN South Africa 1983-1988CRYSTAL RUSSELL South Africa 1983-1985LEVENTHAL TODD United States Information AgencyKALUGIN OLEG D USSR 1960-1992PARKER JAY A South Africa 1984-1985The description of the International Freedom Foundation printed in the 1993 Encyclopedia ofAssociations reads,"*14748* INTERNATIONAL FREEDOM FOUNDATION (Conservative) IFF200 G. St. NE, Ste, 300. Phone:(202) 546-5788Washington, DC 20002. Duncan Sellars, Chm.Founded 1986. Staff:20 Nonmembership. Works to foster individual freedom throughout the world byengaging in activities which promote the development of free and open societies based on theprinciples of free enterprise, while recognizing and respecting the sovereignty and cultural heritageof nations. Believes that freedom of though and expression, and free association without governmentinterference, is essential to human dignity and without protection from violent coercion, liberty andprosperity are impossible. Works to demonstrate the benefits of a "parliamentary" democracy" andexpose the "failures" of a "people's democracy," which the group says, is often referred to as asystem of "freedom" but is actually a guise for totalitarianism. Considers totalitarian systems to bethe "enemies of freedom" and a threat to the security of the West. Encourages and mobilizes supportof indigenous democratic movements. Organizes forums for dialogue and discussion on issues ofhuman rights and free enterprise. Sponsors seminars, fellowships, and international exchanges;maintains speakers' bureau. Telecommunications Services: Fax (202) 546-5488.""Publications Angola Peace Monitor, monthly Covers developments in the Angolan peace process ·Price: $105/year. ISSN; 1045-0513 Circulation 2000. Advertising: not accepted. ·Freedom Bulletin,monthly. Newsletter, includes feature articles on major foreign policy issues. Price: $24/year in U.S.$30/year outside of U.S. ISSN: 0897-5086 Circulation: 221000. i Advertising: accepted. · FreedomBulletin - UK Edition, 6/year. Newsletter including articles on foreign policy issues from British andEuropean perspectives Price: $10/year; £8 /year in United Kingdom. Circulation 6000. · FreedomBulletin - Republic of South Africa Edition, monthly, Newsletter including features on developmentsin South Africa. Price: $20/ year in U.S.; R45/year in South Africa. Circulation: 6000. Advertising:not accepted. · InterAmerican OPPORTUNITIES Briefing, bimonthly. Newsletter; includes businessactivity and economic reform in Latin America. Price: $105 /year. ISSN: 1055-9299. · Laissezfaire,quarterly Journal on European affairs and European-Third World relations; includes book reviews.Price: $30/year in U.S.; £l0/year in United Kingdom. Circulation: 6000. Advertising; accepted.OPPORTUNITIES Briefing, bimonthly. Newsletter; includes free market trends and businessopportunities in Eastern Europe. Price: $105/year. ISSN: 0960-5088. Advertising: not accepted. ·Soviet Perspectives, monthly. Guide to economic reform and business opportunities in the SovietUnion. Price $225/year ISSN: 1055-1042. · Sub-Sahara Monitor, monthly. Newsletter ; includespolitical and economic issues, periodic country reports, aid and trade briefs, investment analysis,and book reviews. Price: $105/year. ISSN: 1018-1520. · terra nova, quarterly. Journal containingscholarly articles on foreign policy issues, as related to free market economic and political thought;includes book reviews. Price: $24/year. ISSN: 1056-8018. Circulation: 7000. · Also publishesmonographs, posters, and reports produces videotapes."If the International Freedom Foundation is a front for Intelligence organizations do their publicationscontain information telling intelligence agents what to do?Why didn't Newsday connect the International Freedom Foundation to the Council on ForeignRelations? Did the Truth and Reconciliation Commission investigate the Council on ForeignRelations/Royal Institute of International Affairs/South African Institute of International Affairs rolein creating the racial tension, hatred and genocide in South Africa? If they did, what were theirfindings? If they did not, don't you think it is about time they did?The Newsday article follows:NEWSDAY Sunday July 16, 1995 Front for Apartheid Washington-based think tank said to be partof ruse to prolong power This article was reported by Dele Olojede in South Africa and Timothy M.Phelps in Washington, and was written by Olojede.Then Secretary of State [CFR member] George Shultz shakes hands with Oliver Tambo, the lateexiled leader of ANC, at State Department in 1987.Johannesburg, South Africa A respectable Washington foundation, which drew into its webprominent Republican and conservative figures like Sen.. Jesse Helms and other members ofCongress, was actually a front organization bankrolled by South Africa's last white rulers to prolongapartheid, a Newsday investigation has shown.The International Freedom Foundation, founded in 1986 seemingly as a conservative think tank, wasin fact part of an elaborate intelligence gathering operation, and was designed to be an instrument for"political warfare" against apartheid's foes, according to former senior South African spy CraigWilliamson. The South Africans spent up to $1.5 million a year through 1992 to underwrite"Operation Babushka," as the IFF project was known.The current South African National Defence Force officially confirmed that the IFF was its dummyoperation."The International Freedom Foundation was a former SA Defence Force project," Army Col. JohnRolt, a military spokesman, said in a terse response to an inquiry. A member of the IFF"sinternational board of directors also conceded Friday that at least half of the foundation's funds camefrom projects undertaken on behalf of South Africa's military intelligence, although he refused to saywhat these projects were except that many of them were directed against Nelson Mandela's AfricanNational Congress.A three-month Newsday investigation determined that one of the project's broad objectives was to tryto reverse the apartheid regime's pariah status in Western political circles. More specifically, the IFFsought to portray the ANC as a tool of Soviet communism, thus undercutting the movement's growinginternational acceptance as the government-in-waiting of a future multiracial South Africa."We decided that, the only level we were going to be accepted was when it came to the Soviets andtheir surrogates, so our strategy was to paint the ANC as communist surrogates," said Williamson,formerly a senior operative in South Africa's military intelligence, who helped direct Babushka. "Themore we could present ourselves as anti-communists, the more people looked at us with respect.People you could hardly believe cooperated with us politically when it came to the Soviets."The South Africans found willing, though possibly unwitting, allies in influential Republicanpoliticians, conservative intellectuals and activists. Sen. Jesse Helms, now chairman of the SenateForeign Relations Committee, served as chairman of the editorial advisory board for the foundation'spublications. Through a spokesman, Helms said that he did not know anything about the foundation."Helms has never heard of the International Freedom Foundation, was not chairman of their advisoryboard and never authorized his name to be used by IFF in any way shape or form. We never had anyrelationship with them," Mere Thiessen, a Helms spokesman, said.Rep. Dan Burton, who was the ranking Republican on the House subcommittee on Africa, and Rep.Robert Dornan were active in IFF projects, frequently serving on its delegations to internationalforums. Alan Keyes, currently a candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, also served asadviser. (He did not return a call seeking comment.) The Washington lobbyist and former movieproducer Jack Abramoff, and rising conservative stars like Duncan Sellers, helped run the foundation.All those contacted denied knowing that it was controlled and funded by the South African regime.Although there are strong indications that U.S. laws may have been broken some IFF officials haveadmitted in interviews that they knew that South African military intelligence money helped pay forthe foundation's activities in Washington there is no clear evidence that the politicians associatedwith IFF either took campaign contributions or otherwise directly benefited financially from thefoundation .Under U.S. law, anyone who represents a foreign government or acts under its orders, direction orcontrol, has to register with the Justice Department as a foreign agent. Asked if a "think-tank" sup upand supported by a foreign government has to register, a Justice official said, "If the foreign[government] has some say in what they are doing and, obviously, if they are funding it they probablydo then they probably do have to register." Violation of the law carries a fine up to $10,000 and aprison term of up to five years.Several key figures involved in the IFF and contacted by Newsday denied any knowledge that thefoundation was a front for the political agenda of a foreign government. Duncan Sellers, now aVirginia businessman, said, "This is nothing I ever knew about. It's something that I would haveresigned over or closed the foundation over. I would have put a stop to it.""The Congressman didn't know anything about it," said a spokesman for Dornan, Paul Morrell. "Thisis all news to him if it is true." Morrell described Dornan's impression of the IFF as simply "profreedom,pro-democracy, pro-Reagan."Phillip Crane, another U.S. representative listed as an IFF editorial adviser, joined the board in 1987at the request of Abramoff, said an aide, and by 1990 had quit. "He never attended a board meetingthat he can recall," said the aide, Bob Foster. "He had no idea that any such situation [intelligenceconnections] existed."Williamson said that the operation was deliberately constructed so that many of the people would notknow they were involved with a foreign government. "That was the beauty of the whole things guyspushing what they believed," he said. Helms for example, voted against virtually every punitivemeasure ever contemplated against South Africa's white minority government, however mild. AndBurton was nearly hysterical in arguing against sanctions that a large bipartisan majority passed in1986 over President Ronald Reagan's veto, at one point warning that "there will be blood running inthe streets" as a result.But in some cases, such as Abramoffs, the relationship with the South African security apparatus wasmore than merely coincidental, according to Williamson and others. A former chief of intelligence,now retired, said emphatically that the South African military helped finance Abramoffs 1988 movie"Red Scorpion." The movie was a sympathetic portrayal of an anti-communist African guerrillacommander loosely based on Jones Savimbi, the Angolan rebel leader allied to both Washington andPretoria. Williamson also said the production of "Red Scorpion" was "funded by our guys," who inaddition provided military trucks and equipment -as well as extras .Abramoff reacted with anger when told of the allegations Friday, saying his movie was funded byprivate investors and had nothing to do with the South African government. "This is outrageous," hesaid.Details of South Africa's intelligence operations in the last years of apartheid have begun to rapidlyemerge with the imminent establishment of a Truth Commission by the Mandela government. Thecommission will elicit confessions of "dirty tricks" by apartheid's foot soldiers and theirCommanders, in exchange for immunity from prosecution. Williamson, for instance, recentlyrevealed that he was involved in the assassination of Ruth First, wife of the ANC and South AfricanCommunist Party leader Joe Slovo, and other anti-apartheid activists.In South African government thinking, the IFF represented a far more subtle approach to defeatingthe anti-apartheid movement. Officials said the p!an was to get away from the traditional allies ofPretoria, the fringe right in the United States and Europe, "some of whom were to the right ofGhengis Khan," said one senior intelligence official. Instead, they settled for a front staffed withmainstream conservatives who did not necessarily know who was pulling the strings."They ran their own organization, but we steered them, that was the point," Williamson said."They were very good, those guys, eh?" said Vic McPheerson, a police colonel who ran securitybranch operations and participated in the 1982 bombing of the ANC office in London. "They werenot just good in intelligence, but in political warfare."Starting in 1986, when Reagan failed to override comprehensive U.S. economic sanctions, the SouthAfrican government began casting about for ways to survive in an international environment morehostile to apartheid than ever. A very senior official in South African military intelligence, to whomIFF handlers reported at the time, said the operation cost his unit between $l million and $1.5 milliona year. The retired general said the funds represented almost all of the IFF's annual operating budget,although the foundation gained such legitimacy that it began to attract funding from individuals andgroups in the United States.On at least one occasion, the IFF had trouble accounting for its money. It was unable to comply in1989 with a New York State requirement that it provide an accountant's opinion confirming that itsfinancial statements "present fairly the financial position of the organization." It was eventuallybarred, in January, 1991, from soliciting funds from New York. According to financial recordsprovided by Jeff Pandin, the foundation's last executive director in Washington, IFF revenue in 1992dropped by half of the preceding year's, to $1.6 million. It just so happened that President FrederikW. de Klerk ended secret South African funding for the foundation in 1992, in response to pressurefrom Mandela to demonstrate that he was not complicit in "Third Force" activities. Pandin expressedshock that much of the organization's money had been coming from clandestine South Africansources. "I worked for the IFF from Day One to Day End," he said. "This is complete news to me."He said he once had met Williamson when he was in Mozambique, but was unaware of any officiallinks.On the surface, the IFF's headquarters was in north-east Washington, D.C., , at 200 G Street, nextdoor to the Free Congress Foundation, another conservative institution. From that base, it launchedcampaigns against communist sympathizers and perceived enemies of the free market. It broadlysupported Reaganism, and its principal officers ran with the Ollie North crowd. But it always paidspecial attention to ANC. When Mandela made his first visit to the United States in 1990, followinghis release from prison, the IFF placed advertisements in local papers designed to dampen publicenthusiasm for Mandela. One ad in the Miami Herald portrayed Mandela as an ally and defender ofCuba's Fidel Castro. The city's large Cuban community was so agitated that a ceremony to presentMandela with keys to the city was scrapped.The IFF published several journals and bulletins, in Washington and in its offices in Europe andJohannesburg. One of its contributors was Jay Parker, an African-American who was a paid publicrelations agent of successive apartheid regimes throughout the 1970s and 1980s. People like HenryKissinger were invited to IFF seminars to deliver keynote speeches. The foundation brought togetherthe together the world's top intelligence experts at a 1991 conference in Potsdam, Germany, to mullover the changing uses of intelligence in the post-Cold War world. Among those in attendance wasformer CIA director William Colby and a retired senior KGB general, Oleg Kalugin. The IFF alsowaged a major but not surprisingly futile campaign for U.S. retention of the Panama Canal. But itsmain purpose was always to serve the ultimate goals of the South African government, according tothose who helped nudge it in that direction. The former senior South African military intelligenceofficial said he traveled to the United States and Canada in 1988 as a guest of the IFF. But the realreason for his trip, he said, was to try to strengthen South African intelligence operations on theground, at diplomatic posts and the North American offices of Satour, the country's tourismpromotion agency."I was surprised at the kind of access the IFF operation provided us," said Wim Booyse, who went bythe title of Senior Research fellow at the Johannesburg office of the IFF. Booyse said when he visitedWashington In 1987 to attend IFF-sponsored seminars, part of the propaganda training he and othervisitors received came from a disinformation specialist at the United States Information Service, anofficial he identified as Todd Leventhal. Leventhal said in response that he remembered meeting withBooyse and possibyly a few other IFF people, but gave no formal talk and talked to them only aboutcountering disinformation, not spreading itFar from being a mere branch of the IFF, the Johannesburg office was in fact the nerve center of IFFoperations worldwide. According to Martin Yuill, who served as administrator of the "branch," hebegan to realize that perhaps Johannesburg was not just a branch office after all, since it was alwaysdeciding how much money the other offices, Including the Washington headquarters, should have. "Iguess one would have to conclude that that was the case," he said.Although he insisted that the IFF was no clandestine operation, Russell Crystal who ran theJohannesburg office, said it was vital to the foundation. He said Friday in an interview that "jobs" forSouth African intelligence provided at least half of total IFF revenue, and that he sometimes askedmilitary intelligence to send the fees from these "jobs" directly to the Washington office of the IFF."The military intelligence, there were certain things they wanted done -- tackling the ANC as aterrorist-communist organization," Crystal said. "The projects we did for them, they paid for. " Headded that it was not impossible that South Africa accounted for far more than his estimated 50percent, of IFF revenues.As an example of this "tackling," Crystal cited the targeting of Oliver Tambo, whenever the lateexiled leader of the ANC traveled around the world. Once, when Tambo visited with George Shultz,then-secretary of state, the IFF arranged for demonstrators to drape tires around their necks to protestthe "necklace" killings of suspect ed government informers in black townships in South Africa."The advantage of the IFF was that it pilloried the ANC," said Williamson. "The sort of generalwestern view of the ANC up until 1990 was a box of matches [violence] and Soviet-supporting --slavishly was the word we latched on. That was backed up with writings, intellectual inputs. It was amatter of undercutting ANC credibility."By 1993, the IFF effectively shut down after de Klerk pulled the plug on many politically motivatedclandestine operations. But the IFF did not go down before one final parting shot.In January that year, the foundation financed a investigation into alleged human rights abuses duringthe 1980's at ANC guerrilla camps in Angola. Bob Douglas, a South African lawyer, concluded therewas evidence of torture and other abuses, forcing the ANC to acknowledge some abuses. Douglassaid Friday he did not believe that the IFF worked for military intelligence. "I did a professional jobfor which I charged professional fees," he said crossly. "I did my job of work, I finished my work,and had nothing to do with it since then."WEB ARTICLE ENDSAlso see:http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=International_Freedom_FoundationSOURCESNB: I have not integrated print sources published after this book was last revised in1993-1994. The most important later print sources not integrated here are a seriesof articles in British newspapers on Jonathan Aitken, Julian Amery and the post-Crozier Cercle in the late 1990s, Robert Hutchinson's 1997 book on Opus Dei, PaulLashmar and James Oliver's 1998 book on the IRD, Stephen Dorril's 2001 book onMI6 which (amongst many other things) describes MI6’s pre-war and wartimerelationship with Habsburg, and David Rockefeller's 2002 memoirs detailing theearly days of the Pesenti group – there may well be other sources of which I amunaware.BOOKS AND ESSAYSAnderson and Anderson, Inside the League, Dodd, Mead & Co, New York 1986.Bacelon, Jacques, La République de la Fraude, Jacques Grancher éditeur, Paris1986.Bale, Jeffrey M., Right-wing terrorists and the Extra-parliamentary Left in post-WorldWar II Europe: Collusion or Manipulation?, Berkeley Journal of Sociology 32/1987, andLobster 18, October 1989.Bellant, Russ, Old Nazis, the New Right and the Reagan Administration, PoliticalResearch Associates (678 Massachusetts Avenue, Suite 205, Cambridge, MA 02139,USA), 1988.Benjamin, Mico and Dethy, Jean-Michel, L'Ordre Noir, Editions Pierre de Méyère,Brussels 1977.Blackstock, Nelson, Cointelpro, Anchor/Pathfinder Press, New York 1988.Bloch, Jonathan and Fitzgerald, Patrick, British Intelligence and Covert Action,Brandon Press, Dingle 1983.Bouffioux, Michel, Pour - sous la plage, des pavés, thesis for Faculty of Philosophyand Arts of the ULB, Brussels 1987.Bourdrel, Philippe, La Cagoule - 30 ans de complots, Editions J'ai Lu, Albin Michel,Paris 1970.Boyer, Jean-François, L'Empire Moon, La Découverte, Paris 1986.Brewaeys, Philippe and Deliège, Jean-Frédérick, De Bonvoisin et Cie, EPO, Brussels1992.Campbell, Duncan and Connor, Steve, On the Record - Surveillance, computers andprivacy, Michael Joseph, London 1986.Cavendish, Anthony, Inside Intelligence, Collins, London 1990.Christie, Stuart, Stefano delle Chiaie - portrait of a black terrorist, AnarchyMagazine/Refract Publications, London 1984.Christie, Stuart, The Investigative Researcher's Handbook, BCM Refract, London nodate.Churchill, Ward, and Vander Wall, Jim, Agents of Repression: the FBI's secret warsagainst the Black Panther Party and the American Indian Movement, South End Press,Boston, Mass 1988.Churchill, Ward, and Vander Wall, Jim, The Cointelpro Papers - Documents from theFBI's secret war on domestic dissent, South End Press, Boston, Mass 1990.Clark, Alan, Diaries, Phoenix Books, London 1994.Cooley, John K., Unholy Wars, Pluto, London, 1999; second edition, Penguin India,2001.Cornwell, Rupert, God's Banker, Unwin, London 1984.Coxsedge, Coldicut and Harant, Rooted in Secrecy - the clandestine element inAustralian politics, Committee for the Abolition of the Political Police, Balwyn North,Victoria, Australia, 1982.Crozier, Brian, Free Agent - the unseen war 1941 - 1991, Harper-Collins, London1993.Deacon, Richard, The Truth Twisters, McDonald, London 1987\Futura, London 1988(page numbers refer to the Futura edition).De Bende Tapes - see under Various authors.De Bock, Walter, Les plus belles années d'une génération - l'Ordre Nouveau enBelgique avant, pendant et après la Seconde Guerre Mondiale, EPO, Berchem 1983.Die Contra Connection - see under Various authors.Dirtywork 1 - see under Various authors.Dorril, Stephen, A Who's Who of the British Secret State, Lobster Special, June 1989.Dorril, Stephen and Ramsay, Robin, In a Common Cause - the Anti-CommunistCrusade in Britain 1945-60, Lobster 19, May 1990.Dorril, Stephen and Ramsay, Robin, Smear! Wilson and the Secret State, FourthEstate (289 Westbourne Grove, London W11 2QA; page numbers refer to thisedition), 1991; Harper-Collins, 1992.Dumont, Serge, Aginter-Presse et la Belgique, annex in his Les mercenaires, EPO,Berchem 1983, pgs 174-179.Dupont, Gilbert and Ponsaers, Paul, Les tueurs, EPO, Berchem, 1988.Engelmann, Bernt, Hotel Bilderberg, Steidl, Göttingen 1991.Eringer, Robert, The Global Manipulators, Pentacle, Bristol 1980.Faligot, Roger, Guerre spéciale en Europe, Flammarion, Paris 1980.Faligot, Roger and Krop, Pascal, La Piscine - les services secrets français 1944-84,Seuil, Paris 1985 (page numbers refer to this version); La Piscine, Blackwell, Oxford1990.Fallon, Ivan, Billionaire - the Life and Times of Sir James Goldsmith, Hutchinson,London 1991.Fletcher, Richard, British Propaganda since WW2: a case study, Media Culture andSociety, Vol. 4 1982.Foot, Paul, Who framed Colin Wallace?, Pan, London 1990.Freemantle, Brian, CIA, Futura, London 1984.Ganser, Daniele, Terrorism in Western Europe: An Approach to NATO’s Secret Stay-Behind Armies, Whitehead Journal of Diplomacy and International Relations, Winter-Spring 2005.Gemballa, Gero, Geheimgefährlich - Verfassungschutz, BND, MAD, Stasi, PapyRossaVerlag, Köln 1990, pgs 148-151.Gijsels, Hugo, L'Enquête - 20 années de déstabilisation en Belgique, La Longue Vue,Brussels 1990 (original Flemish title: De Bende et Cie, Kritak, Leuven 1989).Gijsels, Hugo, Het Leugenpaleis van VdB, Kritak, Leuven 1990.Gijsels, Hugo, Netwerk Gladio, Kritak, Leuven 1991.Gladio - see under Various authors.Gonsalez-Mata, Les vrais maîtres du monde, Grasset, Paris 1979.Haquin, René, Des taupes dans l'extrême droite - la Sûreté de l'Etat et le WNP, EPO,Berchem undated.Haykal, Mohammed, Iran - the Untold Story, Pantheon, New York, 1982.Heigl, Frank P. and Saupe, Jürgen, Operation Eva - die Affäre Langemann, Konkret,Hamburg 1982.Herman, Edward and O'Sullivan, Gerry, The "Terrorism" Industry, Pantheon Books,New York 1989.Hirsch, Kurt, Rechts von der Union, Knesebeck und Schuler, Munich 1989.Höhne, Heinz and Zolling, Hermann, The General was a spy, Pan, London 1973.Hollingsworth, Mark and Norton-Taylor, Richard, Blacklist - the inside story ofpolitical vetting, Hogarth Press, London 1988.Holroyd, Fred with Burbridge, Nick, War without Honour, Medium (1a Clumber St.,Hull HU5 3RH), 1989.Howarth, Patrick, Undercover - the men and women of the SOE, Arrow, London 1990.IGfM - see under Various authors.Klaus, Thomas, Der Messias mit dem Hakenkreuz, Verlagswerkstatt, Leutkirch 1991.Knight, Derrick, Beyond the Pale, London 1982.Laurent, Frédéric, L'Orchestre Noir, Stock, Paris 1978.Leigh, David, The Wilson Plot, Heinemann, London 1988.Les Tueries du Brabant - see under Various authors.Le Vaillant, Yvon, Sainte Mafia, Mercure de France, Paris 1971.L'Extrême Droite et l'Etat - see under Various authors.Manz, George Martin, The Lie Machine, Top Secret, Number 1/89 (Postfach 270324,5000 Köln 1, West Germany).Marks, John, The Search for the Manchurian Candidate, Allen Lane, London 1979.Mungo, Aldo ("Michel de Frocourt"), Enquêtes et Reportages - Renifleurs: la verité,Phébus, Brussels, March 1985.Naylor, R.T., Hot Money and the Politics of Debt, Unwin, London 1987.Norton-Taylor, Richard, In Defence of the Realm?, Civil Liberties Trust, London 1990.Péan, Pierre, Affaires Africaines, Fayard, Paris 1983.Péan, Pierre, V, Fayard, Paris 1984.Penrose and Courtiour, The Pencourt File, Secker and Warburg, London 1978.Pincher, Chapman, The Truth about Dirty Tricks, Sidgwick & Jackson, London 1990.Prouty, Col. L. Fletcher, The Secret Team, Ballantine, New York 1974.Ramsay, Robin and Dorril, Stephen, Wilson, MI5 and the rise of Thatcher, Lobster 11,April 1986.Raw, Charles, The Money Changers, Harvill (HarperCollins), London, 1992.Rees, Mervyn and Day, Chris, Muldergate – the story of the Info Scandal, Macmillan,London and South Africa, 1980.Reeve, Gillian and Smith, Joan, Offence of the Realm, CND Publications (22/24Underwood St, London N1), 1986.Retinger, Joseph, Joseph Retinger - Memoirs of an Eminence Grise, ed. J. Pomian,Sussex University Press, London 1972.Rimbaud, Christiane, Pinay, Perrin, Paris 1990.Roth, Jürgen and Ender, Berndt, Geschäfte und Verbrechen der Politmafia, IBDKVerlag, Berlin 1987.Roth, Jürgen, Die Mitternachtregierung, Rasch und Rohring Verlag, Hamburg 1990.Saunders, Frances Stonor, Who Paid the Piper? The CIA and the cultural Cold War,Granta, London, 1999.Schnüffelstaat Schweiz - see Various authors.Sick, Gary, October Surprise, I. B. Tauris, London 1991.Smith, Lynn, Covert British Propaganda: IRD 1947-77, Millenium, Journal ofInternational Studies, No.1, 1980.Snepp, Frank, Decent Interval, Penguin, London 1980.Spiegel-Buch - see Various authors.Stevenson, Sir William, Intrepid's Last Case, Michael Joseph, London 1984.Stewart-Smith, D. G., No Vision Here - non-military warfare in Britain (foreword byJulian Amery), Foreign Affairs Publishing Company, Richmond 1966.Thomas, Gordon, Journey into Madness, Corgi, London 1989.The Great White Hoax - see Various authors.Toczek, Nick, The Bigger Tory Vote, AK Press (3 Balmoral Place, Stirling, ScotlandFK8 2RD), 1991.Unheimliche Patrioten - see Various authors.Valentine, Douglas, The Phoenix Program, Avon, New York 1992.Van Bosbeke, André, Opus Dei en Belgique, EPO, Berchem, 1986.Van der Pijl, Kees, Een Amerikaans plan voor Europa, achtergronden van de EEG,SUA, Amsterdam 1978.Van Doorslaer, Rudy and Verhoeyen, Etienne, L'Assassinat de Julien Lahaut - unehistoire de l'anticommunisme en Belgique, EPO, Berchem 1987.Various authors, De Bende Tapes, Kritak, Antwerp 1990.Various authors, Die Contra Connection, Konkret Verlag, Hamburg 1988.Various authors, Dirtywork 1: the CIA in Western Europe, ed. Agee, Philip and Wolf,Louis, Zed Press, London 1978.Various authors, Gladio, EPO, Brussels/Berchem 1991.Various authors (IFF), Intelligence and the New World Order (proceedings ofAssessing U.S. Intelligence Needs for the 1990s, a series of seminars held inSeptember and October 1991 in Washington D.C. and National Intelligence Agenciesin the period of European Partnership, a conference held on November 15, 1991 inSchloss Cecilienhof, Potsdam, Federal Republic of Germany), International FreedomFoundation German Branch, 1992.Various authors, Les Tueries du Brabant, introd. Jean Mottard and René Haquin,Editions Complexe, Brussels 1990.Various authors, L'Extrême Droite et l'Etat, EPO, Berchem undated.Various authors, Propagandisten des Krieges, Hintermänner der Contra:"Internationale Gesellschaft für Menschenrechte" (IGfM), Arbeitskreis Nicaragua,Edition Nahua (Postfach 101320, 5600 Wuppertal 1, West Germany), 3rd edition1987.Various authors, Schnüffelstaat Schweiz, Komitee Schluss mit dem Schnüffelstaat,Limmat Verlag, Zürich 1990.Various authors, Spiegel-Buch – Uberlebensgross Herr Strauss, Rowohlt TaschenbuchVerlag, Reinbek bei Hamburg, 1980.Various authors, The Great White Hoax - South Africa's international propagandamachine, Africa Bureau, London 1977.Various authors, Unheimliche Patrioten, Limmat Verlag, Zürich 1979.Verhoeyen, Etienne and Uytterhaegen, Frank, De Kreeft met de zwarte Scharen,Frans Masereelfonds, Gent, 1982.Verrier, Anthony, Through the Looking Glass - British Foreign Policy in the Age ofIllusions, Jonathan Cape, London 1983.Walraff, Günter, Die Aufdeckung einer Verschwörung, Kiepenheuer und Witsch, Köln1976.Walsh, Michael, The Secret World of Opus Dei, Grafton, London 1989.Willan, Philip, Puppetmasters - the political use of terrorism in Italy, Constable, London1991.Willems, Jan, VdB - un citoyen au-dessus de tout soupçon, EPO, Berchem undated.Winter, Gordon, Inside BOSS, Penguin, London 1981.Winter, Gordon, Inside BOSS and After, Lobster 18, October 1989.Winter, Gordon, Vindication is a dish still edible when cold, Lobster 48, Winter 2004.Woodward, Bob, Veil, Headline, London 1988.Wolton, Thierry, Les écuries de la Vième, Grasset, Paris 1989.Wright, Peter, Spycatcher, Heinemann, Australia 1987.Yallop, David, In God's Name, Corgi, London 1987.Young European Federalists, Mobilmachung - Die Habsburger Front, Bonn and Berlin1979.Young, George Kennedy, Subversion and the British Riposte, Ossian, Glasgow 1984.Zangrandi, Inchiesta sul SIFAR, Editori Riuniti, Italy 1972.SPECIALIZED JOURNALSCelsiuS (Mantrant, BP 2128, 1000 Bruxelles 1, Belgium), numbers 12, 14, 15, 16,17, 21, 22, 23, 24, 26, 29, 30, 31, 34, 39, 52.Covert Action Information Bulletin, no. 7 (December 1979 - January 1980); no 10(August-September 1980).Fiche & Fouine, (Comité En finir avec l'Etat fouineur, rue de la Borde 11, 1018Lausanne, Switzerland), number 1, February 1990.Lobster (214 Westbourne Avenue, Hull HU5 3JB, UK) numbers 3 (1984), 4 (1984), 11(Ramsay and Dorril, 4/86), 14 (9/87), 16 (7/88), 17 (11/88), 18 (10/89), 19 (5/90),22 (1991), and Lobster Special Issues, A Who's Who of the British Secret State,Stephen Dorril, June 1989, and The Clandestine Caucus – anti-socialist campaignsand operations in the British Labour Movement since the war, Robin Ramsay, undated(c. 2000).State Research no. 1, October 1977, and no. 7, August/September 1978 (nos. 1 – 7published in Review of Security and the State 1978, Julian Friedmann, London1978); nos. 8 – 13 published in Review of Security and the State 1979, JulianFriedmann, London 1979; State Research no. 15 (Dec 1979 - Jan 1980), no. 16(February-March 1980), no. 17 (April-May 1980), no. 22 (February-March 1981).Top Secret, Number 1/89 (Postfach 270324, 5000 Köln 1, West Germany).PRESSCity Limits, 14/8/86.Daily Mail, 22/12/76.Daily Mirror, 14/12/90.Daily Telegraph, 20/11/86.De Morgen, 1-12/7/89Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 30/3/85.Guardian, 20, 21, 31/12/76, 27/1/78, 7/6/78, 6/5/80, 3/10/80, 18/12/81,11/2/83, 30/4/83, 8/10/83, 21, 22, 28/2/85, 26/11/85, 26/6/87, 2/10/89,11/10/89, 14+15/12/89, 26/7/91, 24-5/8/91.International Herald Tribune, 15/9/58 (republished in the IHT on 15/9/08),12/06/02.L'Espresso, 17/12/74.Le Monde, 24/2/78, 21/3/85.Le Soir, 4/9/91.Le Vif/L'Express, 19/5/89.Leveller, 64/1981.Libération, 9/10/75, 9-10 + 11/4/76.Libertés, 14/2/91, and 9, 10, 11, 13-15, 17, 18, 19 and 20-22/4/91.Moscow Literary Gazette, 6/3/85.New Statesman, 15/2/80, 27/2/81, 29/5/87.New York Times, 18/4/85.Observer, 3/2/74, 29/1/78, 7/12/86, 2/10/88, 29/1/89, 9/12/90, 16/12/90,10/2/91, 24/2/91, 2/2/92, 17/5/92.Private Eye, 7/1/77.Spiegel, 9/1980, 10/1980, 32/1980, 34/1980, 35/1980, 36/1980, 41/1980,36/1981, 32/1982, 37/1982, 9/1983, 44/1983, 41/1984, 42/1984, 51/1984,28/1986, 9/11/87.Stern, 7/4/76, 8/1978.Süddeutsche Zeitung, 24-25/10/87.Sunday Times, 7/10/84.Sunday Telegraph, 13/12/87.Tageszeitung, 24/1/87, 16/3/87, 13/5/87, 18/5/87, 20/5/87, 22/5/87, 6/6/87,12/6/87, 3/7/87.Telegraph, 20/11/86.Télémoustique, 27/6/91.Time Out, 27/6-3/7/75, 20-26/6/75, 29/8-4/9/75, 5-11/9/75.Tribune, 2/9/83, 9/9/83.Vrij Nederland, 25/01/92.

About Me

ROLAND SAN JUAN was a researcher, management consultant, inventor, a part time radio broadcaster and a publishing director. He died last November 25, 2008 after suffering a stroke. His staff will continue his unfinished work to inform the world of the untold truths. Please read Erick San Juan's articles at: ericksanjuan.blogspot.com This blog is dedicated to the late Max Soliven, a FILIPINO PATRIOT.
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